On Sunday, Dave and I left Mammoth Lakes and drove south to Lone Pine then to Horseshoe Meadows Campground to try Mt. Langley (14,042ft). The huge campground in a timberline forest at 10,000 feet was deserted.

Next morning we got up at 6:00am and got rolling by 8am which was pretty late considering we're doing the hike in one day. It was 10 miles away, but 7 of the miles were on easy trails without much climbing, and the 3 miles beyond that were supposed to be all class 1 and 2.

We hiked up through the beautiful forest, and then emerged into a vast open basin of alpine meadows and lakes. We could see the sloping bulk of Langley in the distance, and we spotted a gully leading up to a break in the cliffs that looked like class 2. This gully, northwest of Cottonwood Lake #5, turned out to be a mile north of the route over Old Army Pass.

The 2000-foot climb up the gully to the Sierra crest was lonely but beautiful, wandering up through a jumble of boulders as big as pickup trucks, then up sandy scree slopes with huge cliffs above. Above was an amazing sight -- a vast silent sandy plateau extending for about 2 miles, all of it above 13,000 feet, devoid of vegetation, marked only by a climbers' foot trail that looked like a camel track through the Sahara desert. We strolled up that camel track under cloudless skies, heading for the final 500-foot boulder pile that led to the summit. Scrambling up the boulders, it wasn't easy.

At the summit, the view was well worth all the effort that we put into reaching Langley. We were now at 14,000 feet, and the landscape on this plateau was weird. The rocks were of reddish but quartz-rich granite, and were severely weathered into bizarre shapes. Huge solution pockets were worn into the boulders, some completely boring through the rock. We reached the summit, although it was nothing more than the high point of the convex plateau. We were, however, right on the edge of the precipitous north face, and could look down onto the dizzying Arête and towers and gullies dropping into the rubble-filled Tuttle Creek canyon. We found the register, signed it and took pictures of the Geological Seal for proof of us being there. The views, of course, were jaw-droppers. The ever-impressive Owens Valley lay east, Mt. Whitney shining in the sun to the north. To the west, the Great Western Divide stood above the green depths of the Kern Trench. South of us, the Kern Plateau seemed to stretch on forever, with meadows and cone-shaped peaks and dense forest.

Dave and I agreed that by far, the terrains on Langley were impassible making it the most difficult summit that we've ever climbed (Whitney was a breeze compared to Langley). Click here to view pics from our Whitney Hike

The hike down was great fun - we just had to find the correct spot to leave the plateau and go down the steep scree gully (there's no sign of it from the plateau, just a 2-mile long cliff edge).

We got down to Cottonwood Lake #5 at 7:30pm and pumped some drinking water from a stream feeding into the lake, then continued down the beautiful trail past the other Cottonwood Lakes and down into the forest. By that time, it was dark and we had to use flash lights until the full moon was visible above the surrounding hills. At that point, Dave and I were rushing to get back to the car, grab food from the bear containers and head down the windy steep hill down the Horseshoe Meadows Road back to Lone Pine to order Pizza for all of us before they closed. Unfortunately, we got back to camp at 10:00 p.m. right at the closing time for the restaurant. It took Dave and I 14hrs total (2 of those hours were spent taking various breaks). Langley is very doable as a day-hike, even in fall when the days are shorter, just make sure you start the hike early...6am being the ideal time.

Tuesday morning, we had breakfast in Lone Pine and headed home, stopping to explore the strange rock towers of the Alabama Hills above Lone Pine, where many famous movies and cowboy shows were filmed. The ghosts of Gene Autry, Humphrey Bogart, and Jimmy Stewart drifted about in the sun as the east face of Whitney stood sentinel in the distance. What's next! Maybe Mt. Shasta but will have to wait and see.