Safety

SAFETY AND COMMUNICATION:

While cell phones won’t work at base camp or on the trail, Nolan, Brad, and I will have emergency GPS units that can message and call for help.  I have a pulse oximeter in case someone thinks they are feeling the impacts of altitude sickness (more below). I also recommend downloading All Trails or Google Maps for the area of Saddlebag Lake, but I will have a paper map as well with printouts for those who prefer.  

We will be at 9-12k in elevation on this trip, which is considered high altitude, and we should be aware of altitude sickness.  I’ve gotten it mildly a few times, and twice pretty rough.   You never know if it will hit you - some people never get it, and some get it more frequently.  The main symptoms of mild altitude sickness are headache, dizziness, nausea, and exhaustion.  It can get more severe, but generally only at elevations higher than we are going to.  The main way to minimize it is to take it slow, drink plenty of water, and allow your body to acclimate. That’s one reason we sleep at our “base camp” on Thursday night.  There’s one cure for elevation sickness - returning to a lower elevation.  We shouldn’t feel bad at all if we get up higher and it’s just not working out; we can head back down and find another spot to set up camp. 

Along the Saddlebag Lake loop area, we’ll be near 11k.  If you want to scale North Peak, that'll get you 1.5k more.   To give you a sense of what that feels like, it’s about the same as Mammoth or the peak of San Jacinto behind Idyllwild.  What we will be doing isn’t extreme, and plenty of folks will do just fine at this elevation.  That being said, we’ll be in the backcountry, so it’s important to be more aware of it, and you never know how your body will react.