Hi all,

Heading up to Whitney starting this weekend. Camping at the portal, Trail Camp and then Outpost Camp.

I have two tents. One is free standing and the other is not. The non-free standing tent stake supported one is a new one and is very light that I was hoping to try out.

After doing some research here it appears it can be difficult to get stakes in the ground at Trail Camp. I have no experience securing a tent without stakes- specifically having to use rocks. Assume it's just a matter of bringing some extra line and finding some heavy rocks.

In the end, both would need to be secured with rocks, so is one really better or worse then the other?

Thanks in advance.

Yes, soft ground to pound stakes into is a little tricky to find at Trail Camp. There is some, but don't count on it.

Tying the tent to large rocks (plenty of those around ) is what I did and what it looked like many people did when I was there.

I've never tried to tie a non-freestanding tent to rocks, so don't know how that would work out for you.

Thanks Jim,

Appreciate the reply.

On three separate occasions I have stayed at Trail Camp in an ultralight, non-freestanding tent that relied on nothing more than trekking poles to support the roof. I was able to set it up in the dark, it stayed up in the wind and on one trip I needed to use rocks without the help of a single stake. Be creative, take a little extra line and you'll be fine. Stuff sacks can come in handy for key points (you can put multiple rocks in and they're easy to connect to the tent lines). You can also stick a stake in a loop at the end of the line like a "T" and wedge it between two or more rocks. Sometimes you can even share anchors with neighbors.

Awesome. Thanks Goose. Love the idea of using stuff sacks.

And if you end up using rocks, use bigger rocks than you think you need. They always end up moving. Good luck!

Back from my trip. Didn't quite go as planned (see my post under trip reports), but I had no problem getting my tent set up.

I did end up using larger rocks than I thought I needed.