High Sierra Topix

Hello all,

I joined the forum about one year ago as we were preparing for a trip to the Emigrant Wilderness. This is been a tremendous resource.

While I now live in Phoenix, Arizona, I grew up hiking the Sierra and it remains my favorite spot on earth. In my teenage years it was mainly SEKI and the Whitney area. My first trip, which was incredibly memorable, was through Alta Meadow to Moose Lake and then back through Pear Lake area. That was in 1985.

The last couple of years it's been Kearsarge Pass, Whitney, and Emigrant wilderness with my oldest, teenage son.

In a couple of weeks I'll be headed back into Emigrant wilderness with my youngest son, who is just turning 12.

I intended to post a trip report, with lots of pictures, after last year's trip, but never got around to it. I hope to post photos of this year's trip shortly after we come out.

Many thanks to all the great members who post extremely useful information on the site. Whether it be mosquito reports, trip reports with fantastic photos, or the many other useful posts I have found them all incredibly valuable. I hope to contribute to the form going forward

Chris

Hi Chris,

Think you may have forgotten this post earlier back on May 4th, but thanks for
the double intro.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=9329&p=82259#p82259" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

:-)

Bump

hi,
i'm marjolijn (just call me jo) and i just joined, although i probably have been getting info off the forum for years. My husband and i have been alternating between belgium and the bay area since 2007. Started out car camping in the wonderful np's and progressed to even more wonderful short backcountry trips, with highlights like mineral king (unforgettable lake columbine), desolation wilderness (mt tallac to emerald bay), little yosemite (great to be on half dome before the crowds), and devil's postpile to tuolumne via minaret lake (might be our favorite trip ever). Earlier this summer I did an easy first solo overnight at island lake in desolation wilderness, which was a little bit scary but truly magical. Dreaming of the JMT but we're not quite there yet.

In a couple of days we're heading up to lone pine, for a trip from cottonwood lakes to whitney portal through miter and crabtree basin. I'm browsing the forum mainly to get as much info as possible on the cc portions. (the descent from crabtree pass to the lakes looks a bit precarious).

I'll try to do my part after we get back and post some info on how we fared...
thanks to everyone who contributes!
jo

Hi Marjolijn,

Welcome to HST! Congratulations on your first solo trip.

marjolijn wrote:hi,
(the descent from crabtree pass to the lakes looks a bit precarious).

This really depends on how you do with steep looking down hikes. The left route down from the pass looks very steep and precarious, but it is actually a fairly easy (relative to me, not necessarily to you) stair step type of descent. If looking down from the heights doesn't bother you as long as your footing is solid, then there should be no problem. Not knowing your comfortability is a bit of a concern to me as I give this description, so it is not advice, just my experience.

thanks for the info jim. On google earth i could clearly see some switchbacks on the left side, but it does look steeper than the right side. All other info I have (eg whitney - trailhead to summit) talks about traversing to the right from the pass and then down boulders.
Heights are not really an issue, and we're pretty decent scramblers, but we're not that experienced. Any reason why you came down the left side, or did you just end up there and go for it?

We came down the left side (west side) because we were heading down Crabtree Lakes to the PCT and the rangers (rock creek ranger married to the Crabtree meadow ranger) who were sitting on the pass suggested the left side as a good way to go.

I've read some of the reports where people were heading over Crabtree Pass and aiming for Discovery Pinnacle who would take the east side to keep elevation by avoiding going all the way down to the lake. The sand hill up is a major slog, so people have a desire to minimize the trudge of one step up, three steps back.

Please do not use this thread for anything but introductions, any inquiries about
areas or routes need to be done in their own seperate thread. Thank you.