Hiking Mount Whitney

Mount whitney is the tallest peak in the lower 48 states. At 14,508ft elevation and 22 miles out and back, it took me no less than 16 hours to complete. I started at 4:30 am (waking up at 3!) only to get back by 8:30pm. I spent every moment of daylight on Thursday July 28th on that mountain.

It was worth every second.

Even when I was delirious, hallucinating from elevation sickness, my head throbing from built up pressure, I thought it was worth it. There is so much natural beauty in the world.

This is a long post. there are 122 photos after the jump that walks you through my hike.

The trip started with a 5 hour drive from san diego

On the way to lone pine we stopped in this awesome camp site called Cinder Falls.

I was still happy and healthy at this point of the trip!

The crevices are made by small stones on the surface of the rock. They churn in small divits when it rains, and over time, these bowl shaped holes started to form.

Such fresh rock from the center of the earth. Its hard to get a good photo of how black and shiny the rocks were.

We got a camp site at tuttle creek to park the car at, but not to camp at this night.

I was amazed that there was a river in the middle of the desert, but my companions asserted taht this is not the desert, its the eastern sierrras.

This is erics truck.

we went to bonanzas and got this mexican food.

We got another camping spot closer to whitney portal to stay the night. It was an absolutely stunning. I've never stayed in a more beautiful campsite. I didn't get a good photo, but there was a waterfall just beyond these trees.