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LONE PINE |
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Rising out of the northern Mojave Desert, the mountainous backbone
of the Sierra Nevada announces itself with a bang two hundred miles
north of Los Angeles at 14,494ft Mount Whitney , the highest point in
the lower 48 states. A silver-gray ridge of pinnacles forms a nearly
sheer wall of granite, dominating the small roadside town of LONE PINE
eleven thousand feet below. Motels here include the Dow Villa Motel/Historic
Dow Hotel at 310 S Main St (tel 760/876-5521 or 1-800/824-9317, ;
$50-75), where John Wayne always stayed when filming in the area, and
the Best Western Frontier Motel , 1008 S Main St (tel 760/876-5571 or
1-800/528-1234; $35-50). Those headed north might want to push on
sixteen miles to Independence, where the slightly run-down but
atmospheric Winnedumah Hotel , 211 N Main St (tel 760/878-2040; $35-50),
operates as an HI- hostel with $18 beds which includes breakfast. You
can camp at Tuttle Creek campground (free; no water) on Horseshoe Meadow
Road some four miles west of Lone Pine beyond the Alabama Hills. The
Pizza Factory , 301 S Main St (tel 760/876-4707), and the diner-style Mt
Whitney Restaurant , 227 S Main St (tel 760/876-5751), are decent places
to eat . The Eastern Sierra Interagency Visitor Center , a mile south of
town on US-395 at the junction of Hwy-136 (daily: June-Aug 8am-6.50pm;
Sept-May 8am-5.50pm; tel 760/876-6222), is a great source of information
about the Owens Valley.
Many early Westerns, and the epic Gunga Din , were filmed in the Alabama
Hills to the west, a rugged expanse of bizarrely eroded sedimentary
rock. Some of the oddest formations are linked by the Picture Rocks
Circle , a paved road that loops around from Whitney Portal Road,
passing rocks shaped like bullfrogs, walruses and baboons.
Two thousand eager souls make the strenuous 22-mile round-trip hike
(12-16hr; 6100ft ascent) to the summit of Mount Whitney each summer.
Permits are needed and are awarded by lottery: ensure your application
(available at ) is postmarked February and sent to the Wilderness
Reservation Office, Inyo National Forest, 873 N Main St, Bishop, CA
93514 (fax 760/873-2484). On a trial basis, cancelled reservations are
available by phone from 1 to 5pm, Monday to Friday at 760/873-2483. All
hikers pay a $15 fee.
One-day ascents start at dawn from either the Whitney Portal campground
(mid-May to mid-Oct; tel 1-877/444-6777; $13), or the one-night-only
first-come-first-served Whitney Trailhead site ($8) at the end of
twisting Whitney Portal Road, reachable via trailhead shuttle (tel
760/876-5518). The trail cuts up to boulder-strewn Trail Crest Pass, the
southern end of the 220-mile John Muir Trail to Yosemite, then climbs
along the top of vertical cliffs. At the rounded summit, a stone cabin
serves as an emergency shelter-though not one you'd choose to be in
during a lightning storm.
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from $64.79
USD