Thor Peak
Ascent of Thor Peak (Southwest Slope, class 2), with Robert Zeithammer, March 24-25, 2022.
Timeline:
March 24, 2022. I left Mammoth at 6:15 and rejoined Robert on Whitney Portal road, where he had spent the night car-bivying some distance before the locked gate. We finished packing and set out along the road at 8:41. We met a nice woman from Lone Pine who was starting a hike with her dog. She pointed us to a trail shortcut to Whitney Portal which avoids some of the road's switchbacks. We had to hike an additional 1.6 miles to Whitney Portal due to the road closure. There was very little snow on the ground, so we had to carry our skis along the Mount Whitney trail till the 9,400 ft mark. There, we started skinning up the main drainage that leads to Bighorn Park. The temps were so high that we were sweating profusely, and the snow so soft and wet that we would occasionally posthole with our skis (a new experience for me). Things went smoothly, if slowly, and we reached Outpost Camp around 13:00. We set up camp, had lunch, and left to climb Thor Peak around 14:15.
At first we followed the Whitney trail to Mirror Lake, and then started up the very tedious scree- and sand-covered Southwest Slope of Thor Peak. With our lack of acclimatization and state of exhaustion it was a very slow going process. At one point it was necessary to scramble up some loose rocks to avoid some cliffs. This put us in a wide bowl of scree and talus. We aimed toward a broad saddle West of the summit, to try to catch the West Arête. This did not go at the advertised class 2 rating despite repeated attempts, so we looked for an easier way up (much time wasted). Finally we decided to head up a short and narrow chute located southeast of the summit. This led to a notch in the skyline, and the northeast slope/ridge of Thor Peak (Secor would later reveal this to be the Southwest Slope route – class 2). We were on the summit at 17:13. There was an ammo box but no register book, so we did not sign anything. We took multiple pictures of the outstanding views in all directions – Lone Pine Peak, Mount Langley, Mount Irvine, Arc Pass, Consultation Lake, Mount Whitney, Mount Russell, Mount Carillon… We left the summit at 17:30 and made quick work of the descent, reaching camp at 18:59. (A 10:18 hour day, 8:12 hours moving, 7.25 miles, 4,530 feet of elevation gain).
March 25, 2021. Our plan for this day was to skin up to Consultation Lake and ski back down to camp. But I barely slept that night, struggling with arrhythmia. Snow conditions were also very poor – a mix of crust ice and slushy conditions beneath. Robert set out around 8:30 to explore the area, but came back at 9:07 with a report of bad snow conditions. We packed up camp, had tea, lounged around and left at 10:37. We hiked up to a shoulder above camp to try to catch a gully with decent snow. Upon putting on my skis I immediately postholed and fell, so I ended up hiking back along the Whitney Trail, where the snow was firm due to hiker traffic. Despite the added weight on my back, this went well. Robert somehow managed to ski till about the 9,400 feet mark, where we met and changed into hiking boots. The remaining miles went fast – we were back at the cars at 13:44. We went for barbecue in Lone Pine and then parted ways. (A 3:07 hour day, 2:58 hours moving, 5.50 miles, 125 feet of elevation gain).
Trip totals: 13:24 total hours, 11:10 moving hours, 12.75 miles, 4,655 feet of elevation gain.