Re sleeping at altitude (e.g. the trailhead), I think it may be a personal thing. I've always found that it helped ALOT to sleep at the trailhead if I'm driving up from sea level. Those few times I've slept lower down, I've felt really leaden when starting to hike and regretted I didn't sleep higher. It does wonders for me.

Eight hours adapting is better than zero hours adapting. It may not be a magic bullet for everyone, but I think you'd be hard pressed to prove there's no benefit.

fatdad wrote:Re sleeping at altitude (e.g. the trailhead), I think it may be a personal thing. I've always found that it helped ALOT to sleep at the trailhead if I'm driving up from sea level. Those few times I've slept lower down, I've felt really leaden when starting to hike and regretted I didn't sleep higher. It does wonders for me.

Same here. I notice a huge difference.

mrchad9 wrote:Ibuprofen seems perfectly reasonable if it helps, but I was referring to the Diamox (given that he seems to have experience with altitude already and has given no indication that it was necessary in the past).

Diamox seems premature unless an individual has a history of some sort of altitude issue that has already demonstrated a need for it.

I agree. This guy has had enough experience he should know one way or the other. Just offering an opinion. I love the the Onion Valley entrance, that is what really caught my attention.

G

mrchad9 wrote:

fatdad wrote:Re sleeping at altitude (e.g. the trailhead), I think it may be a personal thing. I've always found that it helped ALOT to sleep at the trailhead if I'm driving up from sea level. Those few times I've slept lower down, I've felt really leaden when starting to hike and regretted I didn't sleep higher. It does wonders for me.

Same here. I notice a huge difference.

Absolutely, it is a personal thing. It is all about an individual's physiology, I have no disagreement. We are all different, but all the same, we should share our individual experiences to help others make more informed decisions. I do admit, I have a weakness when it comes to a good night's rest ; )

Thanks for all the replies. I would up trying Mount Gould, up the Kearsarge pass trail to Kearsarge pass, then scramble up to Gould summit ridge and climbed several of the false summits. I studied the true summit tower for 20 minutes or so, scrambling around the base, looking at each route and did not find anything that looked reasonably safe for me, so I skipped it. It appeared beyond hairy in my book. I descended in to the Golden Trout Lake basin, breaking several of my cardinal rules for hiking (namely do not hike off trail in a region I am not familiar with, alone.). I never really found the real trail, guessed wrong on several herd path options, almost got caught on several spots where every down hill option involved going over a cliff or reclimbing several hundred feet, but eventually found a route down. In retrospect University peak was not going to happen, the off trail travel (ie, scree slogs) was 2-3X more difficult then traveling on the excellent trails out there. Since I spooked by Gould, I assume Dragon would be way out of my league.

The John Muir trail went very well. Forester pass was predictably the hardest day, having most of the week's food still in the pack and being relatively unacclimatized. Mt Whitney went well, summitted around dawn from Lakes above Guitar Lake. We had a big T-storm the previous afternoon but had already set up camp so that was more interesting then bad. ~2" hail accumulation. Also a good test for my new tent which did extremely well. Unfortunately I know many were trapped on Whitney for that storm, but as far as I know everyone made it our safe that day.

Perhaps my favorite day was a rest day after Forester where we did a short day hike to Tawny Point & Bighorn plateau.

Thanks again for the input.

Do you have any pics of the storm?

jrbrenvt wrote:Perhaps my favorite day was a rest day after Forester where we did a short day hike to Tawny Point & Bighorn plateau.

That is beautiful back there. I hiked that myself a couple of years ago on a trip over Shepherd Pass. I climbed Tyndall and rather than spend another day in the grimness of Williamson Bowl, decided to explore. Fantastic scenery back there. Glad you had a good time.

I was searching for conditions up to University Pass, when I came upon this extensive acclimatization thread. Geez, all this fuss and chemical alteration over Sierra heights. The only time I ever felt the altitude anywhere in the Sierra was at the beginning of a 2 day run to Yosemite, while "tagging" Whitney's summit on the two miles up from Trail Crest. It really depends on the individual – ya gotta know your own limits. Even 30 years hence, I have no trouble driving to a trailhead and hiking over a 12K pass – well, except for the arthritic knee.