Mt Whitney Zone
Posted By: Julius S. 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 02:30 AM
I finally signed for this forum, after reading a lot of good info about the Sierra on it.
On September 16-18 I took my wife and almost 6 year old daughter on a over night hike up Mt Langley.
We drove from Orange County on the 15th, and we spent the night in the parking lot, for acclimatization.
Left parking lot at 6:30 and made camp at Cottonwood Lake #5 at 1:30. After a cool night, we were up at 5:30 and on the trail by 6:30. We were on top of the Old Army Pass at around 8AM where we had some snacks, then back on the trail.
The long and boring slog up to the head wall of Langley did not sit well with my daughter so I decided to make it a little more interesting for her, and took them up via the SE ridge.
She liked that part the best, and my wife could hardly keep up with us.
After some scrambling and a little snow climb, we made the summit by 12:36.
This was a week before my daughter's 6th birthday.
After a well deserved cupcake at the top, we started down an hour latter, only to hear our girl request that we go all the way down, and not spend one more night at the lake , as per our original plan.
We packed camp and made it to the car by 8PM, and back in Lone Pine for pizza.
She is a special little girl and we are very proud of her.


Here is a link to our pictures of the hike.

http://jsclimbs.zenfolio.com/p665938120

Thanks
Julius




Posted By: CMC2 Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 02:48 AM
What a cutie !! That is really quite an accomplishment. Yesterday was my daughter's 46th birthday and your trip reminded me of a similar family hike 40 years ago up PikesPeak but I didn't bother to take any pictures.

Your daughter has a great future and will someday be quite the mountaineer like our own Laura Molnar.
Posted By: tif Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 02:51 AM
Pretty freaking awesome!! =) I love the photo of your and her backs looking off at the scenery and her holding your arm.

=) tif
Posted By: Chris B Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 03:52 AM
Beautiful pictures and an awesome family adventure/experience. I'm sure she'll treasure it always.

Thanks for sharing!!


-Chris
Posted By: quillansculpture Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 04:44 AM
Seriously....stop it, that is just WAY TOO CUTE!!!!!!!

Congrats! That did look awesome. Certainly brings me back a bit, but my daughter didn't hike. She just slept and liked to be carried :-)
Posted By: mja Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 10:46 AM
Very cute! Love the cupcake at the top. Now that's incentive!
Posted By: Steve C Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 02:17 PM
Amazing! Congratulations raising a cute hiker kid. And congratulations to your wife, too.

You've got to be proud.



Thanks for posting!
Posted By: CaT Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 03:33 PM
Just an amazing and wonderful adventure all the way around.
And my goodness, your pics, esp some of the "panoramic" looking ones of Whitney and the whole Whitney range from both the peak you were on and, I presume, from an aircraft (looking down on Whitney) for some of the others, are excellent and really give a great feel for the vastness and awe-inspiring nature of that area. Thanks for sharing. I'm sure you daughter will remember this trip for the rest of her life.

CaT
Posted By: Julius S. Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/27/11 10:26 PM
Thanks,
A friend flew over the range at the time we were on top.
He was at about 15,500 ft. and was trying to get pictures of us
on the summit.
He had a hard time locating us so he kept on shooting.
I tried to zoom in on us but the image quality degrades.
In frame # 109 we are the silhouettes on the left.
Maybe some climbers can recognize themselves on top of Whitney,
I'll be happy to share the pictures with them.
Julius
Posted By: lynn-a-roo Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/29/11 12:20 AM
You have a beautiful family. You're building such wonderful memories for your daughter....as others said, 'she's a cutie'. I was mesmerized watching the slideshow of your photos, I felt like I was at Disney's California Adventure 'Soaring Over California', I didn't want it to stop.

Wouldn't it be nice if all families would take their children on adventures like you and your wife did. I love all the colors in your wife and daughter's clothes, the contrast of their clothes against the moonscape type surroundings is abosolutely gorgeous. Hey, I noticed your daughter even took a hiking buddy with her strapped to her back.

Thank you and please take more trips and post your photos and story. You made me want to take the same hike you just took.
Posted By: So.BayMark Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/29/11 04:05 AM
Julius nice pictures,and family outing..Frank A. and I passed by your tent(first one we saw coming down from old army) about 1:00pm on that Saturday, we summited at 10:10am..Great day for a hike!

mark
Posted By: Rod Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/29/11 03:50 PM
The full screen slideshow was outstanding. Excellent quality photos. I love the flyovers. What plane was your friend flying. A boxy tail dragger looks like an old Stinson. 15,500 is about the max ceiling on a tail dragger like that unless he has supplemental oxygen and then it is pushing it. Unless it was your friend in the helicopter. That would make more sense altitude wise.
Posted By: Julius S. Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/30/11 01:19 AM
Originally Posted By: Rod
The full screen slideshow was outstanding. Excellent quality photos. I love the flyovers. What plane was your friend flying. A boxy tail dragger looks like an old Stinson. 15,500 is about the max ceiling on a tail dragger like that unless he has supplemental oxygen and then it is pushing it. Unless it was your friend in the helicopter. That would make more sense altitude wise.


Thanks Rod,
My friend was flying a rented plane from Orange County.Don't know what brand, although he told me many times.
The yellow plane in the slideshow is somebody else, on approach to John Wayne , and the chopper was at Bishop airport, where my friend went for lunch after the flyover.
They were using O2 and they had the window open trying to get a clear picture. To bad the camera and lens I gave them to use, was not fully extended to 400MM, and I had to do some heavy crops.
This is a picture I took of them from the top.They were moving at 150MPH so is not that sharp.


Julius
Posted By: Rod Re: 5 year old on Langley - 09/30/11 03:05 PM
OK that makes more sense.Getting a tail dragger up to 15,500 would be tough.With time and patience and maybe a Sierra wave updraft you can get that small taildragger up to altitude. Without supplimental oxygen it would be dangerous unless he is really acclimated to that altitude. It is suggested maybe regulated now over 15K to use O2. I assumed the plane you were talking about was the one in the slideshow.The last plane is quite a different plane.
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