I’m sitting in a bed at the Whitney Portal Hostel. I just completed the 100 mile stretch from Kennedy Meadows to Kearsarge pass (where I exited the trail this afternoon). It’s the real deal now, the desert had its rough moments, but there was always a trail house, burger joint, resupply, bail out hitch, etc. just a day or two away in case anything went wrong.

Now the trail doesn’t cross a road for 203 miles (we have to take side trips for resupply). Many nights will be spent above 10,000 feet and below freezing. All worth it.

Yesterday I woke up at 1:30 am and started hiking the 7.5 mile approach from Crabtree Meadows to Mt. Whitney at 2 am. No one else in my crew wanted to do the sunrise summit so I opted to do it alone. On a moonless night I could barely see the outlines of the mountains around me, the trail was mostly easy except for a few snow chutes I had to cross (steps had already been cut, so they were easy to navigate – just slightly unnerving to do it in darkness).

Made it to the summit at 5:17 am, just as the horizon was lighting up. The sunrise blew me away, I couldn’t see anything on the way up, now I could see a complete panorama of the Sierra Nevada. NotaChance shows up and we recieve a whiskey donation from some people who were just doing the summit (it will come in handy when we’re freezing later at night)!

It’s early in the day so we get this crazy idea to do Forester pass in the same day (which would be around 7,700 feet of climbing). Forester pass is the highest point on the PCT at 13,200 feet. 20 miles after the summit of Whitney and I’m on the pass staring in disbelief over the north slope. Snow everywhere. It’s 5 pm and I need to drop several thousand feet to find a suitable campsite. After soaking up the sun all day, the snow is ripe for postholing. These miles are painful and slow. Each step is a gamble, my leg might punch straight through to rock (and about 1 in 10 times it does), or I could stay right on the surface. I endure 3 more miles of wet over snow travel and finally make it to the campsite at 8 pm. I stopped feeling my toes an hour ago. There were many trying moments, both mentally and physically but I’m ecstatic. 32 miles, highest mountain in the lower 48, highest point on the PCT, over 7,000 ft of climbing. Just an absolutely epic day.

My shoes were soaked from the snow and creek crossings, so this morning they were frozen solid. It took about 10 minutes to get them on. I should have taken out the laces, still learning!

Tomorrow I’ll head back up through Kearsarge pass and on into Kings Canyon national park. Next resupply is Mammoth!

This guy has been hiking parts of the trail.

Downtime in Kennedy Meadows.

Pure bliss (for about 5 minutes).

South fork of the Kern river.

Campsite before summiting Whitney.

Whitney casts its shadow over the Sierra.

The Whitney Pinnacles.

Forester pass. If you look closely you can see someone in the snow chute.

The north slope of Forester. I’ll camp below the trees in this picture.

andrew batjiaka

pacifc crest trail 2014

pct