E-Ledges.
We took Bob R's Elephant Ear route up the North Fork to the Ebersbacher Ledges. This is not the normal route which crosses the creek and stays south. This route sort of follows the old route through the willow trees. There are a couple of short sections of Class 3 and a narrow 8" ledge about 30 ft high that must be crossed before reaching the E-Ledges.
We continued on to LBSL and UBSL, which was well marked with ducks. After UBSL, we took the waterfall pitch to Iceberg Lake. At the time, I thought this was the only way up and I didn't know there was an easier way if you continued further west (there is also the ridge route). We climbed up the right side of the waterfall, then traversed across it to the far left. I'm not sure if this is the right way to do it. We had to do a somewhat sketchy move to get around a big rock that stuck out onto a ledge.
On the way to Iceberg Lake with Whitney and the Needles in the background.
At Iceberg Lake we fueled up for the final climb. We took the Class 2/3 mini-chute to the left of the main chute, which eventually merges with the main chute at 13,400 ft. This merge was where my friend started to get a headache from the altitude. I didn't have a headache but was feeling nauseated so I didn't mind turning around. We did an acclimatization hike the previous day at 10,000 ft and camped there, but I guess this wasn't enough.
East face of Whitney and the MR chute.
The Class 3 climbing was great fun. The rock quality was excellent. There were numerous cracks that you could use for holds and to wedge your foot into. It was easy Class 3 and some parts could have been Class 2 scrambling on scree and loose boulders. I purposely avoided that stuff and tried to find as much real Class 3 as I could. I learned a lot and become comfortable with down climbing, which is something I've always been nervous about. The exposure didn't seem too bad, but if you fell I suppose you would roll down the chute for a ways and get banged up real good.
On the way back, it started to sprinkle as we got to LBSL. I was worried about descending the E-Ledges on the rain-slicken granite. Sure enough, as we exited the trees at the start of the ledges, I fell and slid down one of the sloping granite slabs. Where I landed was still 15 feet from the edge, but man that was too close. Still, I think this fall was more from fatigue and being careless. The rock was somewhat wet, but still passable.
We also made the rookie mistake of missing the right turn on the ledges and going too far east. Then we made another mistake by jumping down to the wrong ledge. Nothing looked familiar and we knew something was seriously wrong. After looking west and spotting a duck, we climbed back up and picked up the correct route.
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