if you ascend Mt. Whitney in more than one day you need a permit
(as we had trouble getting one in advance we visited the ranger station "on spec" to see what was available)

the ranger said "I can let you have a permit tomorrow, why don't you camp out on my lawn, that way you will be first in the queue"
the following morning out came hot drinks and reservation cards incase anyone tried to queue jump

with a permit for all our team
off we drove to the "start"

the main trail starts at the "Whitney Portal Trail Head" from a large purpose built car park.  The first section of the Whitney Trail is criss crosses the mountain streams, crossing  log bridges.
the path soon forks, split by the huge expanse of the Thor Peak (3751m) buttress.  the main trail blazes its way to the south and after two and a half miles you will pass the Lone Pine Lake under the shadow of the Lone Pine Ridge.

after another mile of pine woodland is the first of two official campsites on the trail - camping away from these sites is restricted.  We continued to the second camp site

a steady climb for half a mile and you arrive at the still waters of Mirror Lake which is where the tree line ends at around 3,250m.

the ascent from the lake takes the climber through meadow, an area of lush greenery above the treeline, to Trail Camp.  This is the usual stopping off point for climbers before an early morning start for the ascent of Mt. Whitney. The area around camp is very rocky thus making life hard when trying to erect a tent

next morning, from the camp it is a short walk to the 'switchbacks' a series of just over 100 seemingly never ending zigzags in the trail. Finally you reach the top of the switchbacks and reach a small snowfield that needs to be traversed.
the snowfield lies in a col on the Trail Crest which at 4199m is on the main ridge between Mt Muir, Mt Whitney and Mt Russell

the three mile walk from the trail crest is a lot gentler, but by now the effects of the altitude are gradually begins to bite

pleasingly the angle becomes easier going as you continue, the ground gets more barren gradually bringing you to the boulder strewn summit of Mt Whitney at 4417 metres.

as mentioned earlier :
the highest peak in the continental U.S. (lower 48 states) is Mt. Whitney,

not mentioned earlier
the lowest point in U.S. is Badwater, Death Valley, also in California(282 ft. below sea level)

so whilst we were in California
as Mt. Whitney and Death Valley are less than 100 miles apart!
we visited both

Mt Biking
Canyon Lands,
Utah