by Jessica SeatonLast year, despite training for and competing in both the Gay Games in Chicago and the FINA Masters World Championships, my swimming seemed to be going nowhere. I needed a mental and physical challenge beyond the pool.
Climbing Mount Whitney had always been a dream of mine and 2007, when I was at the top of my age group, seemed like a good year to indulge in a dramatic form of cross training to achieve a long-held goal. The hike is 22-miles roundtrip and involves a 6200-feet elevation gain between the Mount Whitney Portal trailhead and the 14,494-feet summit of the highest peak in the contiguous United States. I entered the requisite permit lottery and, expecting to have some companions along for the walk, was awarded five permits for a day hike on August 26. That was actually my preferred choice because it was close to a full moon and Whitney day hikes traditionally kick off before dawn.
I began my training steps towards the summit after the Worlds with short hikes in the Santa Monica Mountains and, as my legs got stronger, gradually increased the distances and varied the destinations. Though I did join the Gay and Lesbian chapter of the Sierra Club, finding people to hike with me was no easy task and many of my initial training hikes were solo.
Then Coach Bram suggested that I post a notice on the WH2O bulletin to attract team members interested in attacking Whitney. The first takers were Mike Crosby, who hadn’t made it to the summit during two previous attempts as a teenager, and Carlos Florez. Both men were almost half my age, were obviously in good shape and could carry me down if I was felled by blisters or met up with one the mountain’s notorious black bears.
I literally stumbled upon the next member of the Whitney cross training team one Sunday in early April when, during a 14-mile hike between Will Rogers State Park and Topanga Canyon State Park, I ran into WH2O team member Joel Stratte-McClure, who frequently hikes around LA to stay in shape for his ongoing trek around the Mediterranean Sea. During the next few months our team was completed with the addition of Ron “Rat” Rosager, a college friend of Joel’s, and Anna-Emily “AE” Gaupp, one of my patients who would pick up an additional permit on the day of the hike.
It was clear to me that preparation, good equipment, acclimation to avoid altitude sickness and luck with both the weather and health were the keys to making it up Whitney. Consequently I tried to encourage everyone except Rat, who lives in the Bay Area, to participate in weekly training hikes.
Joel and I were the most obsessive about our training. Our dozen outings together included climbs up Mount Lukens, the highest mountain in the city of Los Angeles; Mount Baldy, the highest mountain in Los Angeles County at 10,020 feet; and Mount San Gorgonio, at 11,500 feet the highest peak in Southern California. Mike and Carlos joined me on another trek up Baldy and AE was along on the hike to the top of San Gorgonio in mid August.
We all knew that the most unpredictable aspect of surmounting Whitney is the weather, particularly lightning storms that force many hikers to abandon their quest during a 10-18 hour round-trip that usually begins with a departure between 4-6 AM. Although it had been sunny for the week prior August 26, the weather forecast predicted thundershowers and lightning on the day of our hike. When I picked up our permits, a ranger advised us to begin the hike at midnight to avoid the lightning expected on the summit at 11 AM on Sunday. Fortunately I had extra batteries for my headlamp and was glad that I’d spent a week acclimating to the altitude in nearby Mammoth.
We were all gathered at the Whitney Portal, where the four men on the team had spent Friday night, on Saturday afternoon when the clouds rolled in and it began to rain with some thunder and lightning. During a rice and tuna “paella” dinner, which we ate under the trees as wasps swarmed the picnic table, we decided to try to sleep for a couple of hours and start the hike at 11 PM.
When we reached the trail the sky was clear, there no clouds, and the nearly full moon and cool temperature made it easy for all of us, with our headlamps beaming, to set off at a good pace. Almost immediately we encountered a hiker coming off the mountain that looked like he’d just finished a 400-meter butterfly without taking a breath. None of us felt encouraged and I silently hoped that I would look better than him when I came down. But we all became much more optimistic when our headlamps caught the attention of four-point buck amidst the trees and the moon rose to illuminate the towering peaks.
We made it through Outpost Camp and Trail Camp, two well-known points on the trail, without too much problem. Whenever the leader would lose the trail due to the darkness, we’d scan the surroundings with our headlamps and the closest person to the trail became the new leader. But when we reached the legendary 96 switchbacks Mike and Carlos fell behind and, we learned later, were forced to abandon the hike once they reached Trail Crest at 13,600 feet because of altitude sickness and dead headlamps.
For the remaining four of us, the final surge to the summit involved a cold walk on a poorly marked and difficult-to-negotiate (in the dark anyway) rock path from Trail Crest, where a sign warned hikers to abandon the ascent at the first hint of lightning. It was still dark when we saw the outline of the stone hut at the top of Whitney and reached the peak at 5:30 AM after hiking 11 miles in 6 hours and 45 minutes.
We were among the first hikers to the summit that morning and bundled up to combat the wind and cold, feast on our “breakfast” and watch the sunrise. As it got lighter an extraordinary landscape emerged out of the darkness to reveal raw-looking peaks nearby and small lakes in the distance.
After watching the cloud-obscured sunrise, we signed the register book and began our descent at 6:30 AM. We immediately realized that the last segment of our walk in the dark had been on a very narrow trail with very steep drop-offs, cliffs and crevices. Happy that we’d avoided a plunge into the abyss, we weren’t in any rush to get down and casually enjoyed the scenery that we’d missed on the way up. The predicted thunder, lightning and rain began just before our arrival at the trailhead thirteen-and-a-half hours after our departure. That night we talked to numerous hikers who, having set off a few hours after we did, were forced to abandon the hike due to the lightning storms.
Although I have no desire to walk up Whitney again in total darkness, I certainly believe it’s an ideal type of cross training. How will it pay off? I expect to swim a 400-meter butterfly without taking a breath as soon as I age up.
