JMT Day 1 – The Best Sunset of my Life

Whitney Portal to Trail Crest

The hostel bed is uncomfortable when I wake up, but it hardly matters. We’re going on an adventure!

After taking my last hot shower for 10 days and getting dressed in my Official JMT Hiking Outfit I head out the door to find coffee while Keith unpacks and repacks his bear canister for what feels like the 10th time in two days. The morning is filled with last minute lounging, packing and repacking and double checking all of the things and then finally it’s time to check out and we have no choice but to just go.

But first, we go in the wrong direction for about 20 miles, heading up to Manzanar Historic Site to score some sweet sweet eclipse glasses. Did I mention that we started our hike on the same day as the Super Great Extra Awesome North American Total Eclipse? Because we did. Although, from our vantage point the sun was largely behind clouds and only at 80% totality, but it was still really cool.

After our detour we head up to Whitney Portal where we’ll begin our hike. We park my car and leave a note to rangers/vandals/whomever that we are JMT hikers and that we’ll be back in three weeks and to please not break into my Subaru. As I write the note I vaguely realize that I’m also giving people an exact timeline for how long they have to break into my car, but against my nature I opt to trust humans and write the note anyway.

At the Whitney Portal store Keith and I order a burger and fries each, and I order a real soda, one with calories, which I sip slowly while the woman at the front desk moves in slow motion and eyes us as we pace around the store. Apparently normal people don’t order burgers at 10:30am and then pace around the store waiting like hungry jackals. Normal people are also unlikely to finish said burgers, and then promptly order another, and then proceed to stuff those burgers into plastic bags for trail dinner.

The counter girl tries and fails to conceal her judgement of us. Or maybe she’s not judging us and that’s just her face.

And now there is nothing to do but hike. Months of planning, and organizing, and stressing out all come down to shouldering a heavy backpack and heading up the trail.  And today, we’ll climb. Climb up to 13,600 feet where we’ll camp among the rocks and the marmots below the summit of Mt Whitney.

The trail is quiet to start and for a while we don’t see anyone. This is hardly shocking given that 11am on a Monday isn’t the best time to start a peak climb. Looking back I wish I had reveled in that quiet trail time more, because shortly we’re among every Los Angeles hiker bro you can imagine and it’s super fucking annoying. People barreling down the trail towards us, refusing to step aside (Note: uphill traffic has right of way, they just do, don’t be a dick about it.). People play music aloud from their portable boom boxes, and a train of army guys almost asphyxiate trying to out hike us.

Keith proposes a game called “Douchebag” in which you have to be the first person to shout “Douchebag!” out loud when you see an full abandoned WAG bag on the side of the trail. After a while we’re shouting “Douchebag!” so often that the game loses some of it’s fun.

* Do you know what a WAG Bag is? It’s a plastic bag filled with the human equivalent of cat litter that the Forest Service gives hikers on Mt Whitney so they can poop in them. And then – and this is the important part – you take it off the mountain with you! Why? Because there are so many people climbing this peak that if everybody took a, literal, shit on it, we’d have a hazmat zone on our hands. Pack out your WAG bag you jerk.

After several hours of hiking we hit trail camp and sit by the small lake eating our cold burgers and french fries. I stare at a WAG bag that somebody has left in the bottom of the lake. People are garbage, and once again I’m torn between my beliefs that all people should have opportunities to explore our protected lands and the fact that most people are kinda crap.

Clouds curdle overhead and it starts to rain lightly and so Keith and I pack up, filter some extra water, and begin the climb up to our campsite for the night. As we climb the other campers at Trail Camp fall away until soon they all look like M&M’s in their bright tents.

The high altitude is sucking away my energy and soon we’re reduced to slow-motion hiking. Step step. Breathe. Step. Breathe. Step step step. Gasp! The world turns into a Tilt-a-Whirl and I start to worry about how I’ll handle sleeping above 13k feet with no acclimatization. Adventure, I remind myself, you’re on an adventure.

Cresting the ridge we’re treated to an incredible sunset. Ya know what? I’m just going to go ahead and claim it as the best sunset of my life so far. It’s that good. With great rays of gold and purple light flooding the valley below our feet, igniting the lakes with a coppery fire.

In the last half mile to camp I take way too many pictures. But I just can’t help myself. When we arrive at camp we find two other hikers, both men, who are at the end of their JMT hike, having summited Mt Whitney earlier in the day. There is general chatter as Keith and I set up our tent, and only later will I realize that we never told them our names, and they never told us theirs. Maybe it doesn’t matter so much on the trail.

We all stand around in silence, staring, as the sun does it’s wonderful things until at last it’s gone and a light snow begins to fall ushering us all into our respective tents.

I fall asleep feeling ridiculously content, wrapped in my warm quilt. We’re doing it, we’re on our adventure.