Mount Kaweah 13,802′
Sierra Nevada
Total Time: 21:50
Distance: 30.1 miles
Elevation Gain: 12,140′
Crux: Class 3
Trailhead: Mineral King, full services
Thanks to the historic winter storms of 22-23′ and Coffepot Fire the summer of 2024, it had been nearly two years since making the long and windy drive into Mineral King. I had ticked off most of the easier SPS summits in the area, and was looking to chip away at some of the harder peaks, specifically in the Kaweah subrange. The highest, Mount Kaweah, seemed like a natural place to start, and as the highest mountain in the Western Sierra Nevada off the Sierra crest, it was also the hardest of the 15 Sierra Club Emblem Peaks to dayhike. I knew the day would clock in at about 30 miles, but I hadn’t looked closely at the elevation gain beforehand- over 12,000′ for the day, shattering a personal best by over 2,000′. I was thankfully oblivious to this fact when I woke in my car at 1:30 AM in Mineral King, setting off by headlamp towards up switchbacks from the Timber Gap trailhead. My plan was to utilize the old use trail up and over Glacier Pass, dropping to Spring Lake before heading up and over Hands and Knees Pass to the Five Little Lakes Basin. I remembered the turn off for the unmarked trail from my climb of Sawtooth and Needham, traversing loose slopes and rockslides before losing the trail entirely and cutting steeply upslope to the pass. The climb to Glacier Pass had taken about 2 hours to ascend the 3,000+’, a quarter of my elevation gain already done for the day. But my progress came to an abrupt halt in dropping off Glacier Pass to Spring Lake, getting cliffed out in multiple class 3 gullies in the dark. I had not read of any difficulties getting up and over the pass so was a bit surprised, and after about 30 minutes of trial and error, eventually found a class 3 gully that went. I skirted Spring Lake to the south, hoping to find a way to keep high and not lose too much elevation for the climb up and out over Hands and Knees Pass, but finding fifth class granite slabs forcing me to the level of the lake anyways. It was fairly tedious sidehilling up to the pass, taking another two hours to reach the notch, dawn breaking just enough for me to spot a class 3 line up and through from below.
My progress had been significantly worse since Glacier Pass, and I was already beginning to doubt my ability to pull off this dayhike in a reasonable time. Thankfully, the other side of Hands and Knees Pass was quite easy, moderately angled sandy slopes to traverse over a shallow ridge into the Little Five Lakes Basin. The Kaweah subrange now dominated the view ahead, the high point of Mount Kaweah the furthest heap of talus to the south and looking the least impressive of the otherwise rugged range, all of them still looking quite far.
I filtered some water at Little Five Lakes and took a short break, needing to pick up the pace now that I was back on trail if I had any hope of finishing at a reasonable hour. I made the descent down to Big Arroyo, half jogging the three miles down to the creek, far from big this late in the season.
Looking up above at the Kaweah from the junction at 9550′, this was the first time I crunched the numbers on my overall elevation gain for the day, realizing it would be over 12,000′, with over 4,000′ of that just to reach the summit and halfway point and an additional ~3,000′ on the return. Woof. The summit was only 5 miles away, and I hopped on the High Sierra Trail, slowly gaining several hundred feet before crossing over a small stream. I filled another liter then left the trail almost directly upslope, finding nice pockets of rocks and boulders to avoid the loose duff.
From below, it looked like the climb to the summit was going to be a painful scree slog, so I was pleasantly surprised to find a nice rib of relatively solid rocks and boulders directed towards the saddle between Mount Kaweah and Second Kaweah, not deteriorating to sand and loose rocks until I was over 12,000′. At the start of the day I had entertained recreating Bob Burd’s dayhike where he was able to tag Second Kaweah as well. But this deep into the day still with 1,000′ of scree to climb to my primary objective, I had ruled out the bonus peak completely, and was pretty amazed he was able to pull it off. At the saddle, the rock quality slightly improved, although I was feeling so worked over 10 hours into my day it was hard to move with any speed or efficiency.
It was 1:30 when I topped out…. on a false summit, the true another quarter mile down the ridgeline. It took another 10 minutes to cover the remaining distance to the summit, and I took a long and well deserved break, the views some of the furthest reaching of any peak I’ve stood on in the Sierra. To the east stood the entire Mount Whitney massif, with Tyndall, Williamson and Keith and Junction Peak slightly further north. Further northeast lay the Great Western Divide, the Palisades peeking over the top. Directly north was haze from the Happy Fire in Kings Canyon, Ritter and Banner faintly visible through the haze. To the west lay all of Mineral King, and it was hard to believe I needed to get up and over two passes to get back to my car.
It was shortly after 2 PM when I started back down the ridgeline to the saddle, this time aiming for patches of sand to boot ski over the pockets of stable rock. Similarly, I took a descent line slightly futher north off the saddle to utilize sandy slopes, although the drainage ultimately pushed me back onto the boulders as I neared the High Sierra Trail. Back at the stream crossing I refilled my water and passed the only two hikers I would see all day. I picked up the pace on the High Sierra Trail, knowing it was basically the last of the easy miles for the day. I was 14 hours in when I reach Big Arroyo, the climb out already in shadow and Mineral King slowly beginning to cast long shadows on the Kaweahs above. My goal now was to try and cover as much ground before the sun set, and I foolishly hoped I could at least reach Hands and Knees Pass before dark.
Although I made good time getting back up to Five Little Lakes, the early sunset of 6 PM meant there just wasn’t enough hours in the day to get to Hands and Knees Pass without needing to flip on my headlamp, now 16.5 hours and 24.5 miles into the day. I had hoped to make up some time dropping towards Spring Lake, and did find some nice sandy slopes to utilize for the descent. But my headlamp was growing dim, meaning I had to move a bit slower than I wanted to avoid wiping out, still taking another hour to get down to the lake. I was a bit worried about finding my class 3 lines back up and over Glacier Pass, particularly since my GPS track was so scattered in that area. But as I rounded the north side of the lake and cut upslope, I was delighted to find a well traveled use trail headed directly for the pass. I would occasionally lose it on granite slabs or in patchy brush, but was able to stick with it almost all the way to the headwall. As I was looking for my class 3 gully exit, I found an easy ramp system with the occasional cairn leading up to the pass, which brought me up slightly east of the actual low point. In daylight, this was probably obvious, and I was quite happy to have had a bit of good luck stumbling on it 18 hours into my day. My headlamp was growing increasingly faint as I descended off Glacier Pass and back down to the trail, and it was nearly dead when I reached the unmarked junction near Monarch Creek. My phone battery was low too, but I had enough juice to use my phone flashlight for the last section of real trail, finishing the dayhike in just under 22 hours, 30.1 miles roundtrip and 12,140′ of elevation gain. I had little hope of finding any place to eat by the time I made it out of Mineral King, and ate what little food I had left in my pack as I passed multiple closed fast food places and gas stations getting back to Highway 99. The following weekend would bring some of the first real snow to the Sierra for the season, bringing an end to my alpine season with my hardest dayhike to date.