The next morning we got up, went through our morning routine, and headed out across the Williamson Bowl at 7.

The view directly up the West Face of Mount Williamson. Note the black streaks at right which indicate the correct route.

The view up the chute from about mid-way up. Despite the unclear route description, the route slowly comes together and becomes more obvious from previous traffic as you near the chute.

Shannon climbing high up in the chute. There was another group above us, but we didn’t see anyone else.

The view down the chute as we got pretty high up. The lake is Lake Helen of Troy in front of Mount Versteeg and the Kaweahs behind.

Shannon resting at the base of the class 3 crack. It wasn’t too long or too difficult. It’s quite deep, so you can get good purchase by jamming your hands in, and the surrounding rock is featured enough to stem on. Class 3 for sure, but not that bad.

The Great Western Divide from the summit.

Above the crack, we popped out on the summit plateau and hopped up talus the final quarter mile or so to the summit. There was an awesome view in all directions.

Close up of the Kaweahs.

The view south of Mount Whitney and the surrounding peaks.

The Great Western Divide to the east.

After maybe 30 minutes on the summit, we headed back down. We ran into another hiker on the summit who was doing the hike in a day from the trailhead. Impressive!

Shannon downclimbing the class 3 crack. This should give a good idea of the difficulty of this little pitch.

The day was really nice and clear, though some cumulus clouds started to form. We found our way back down to the Williamson Bowl without much issue. There wasn’t too much loose rock in the chute to worry about in either direction.

Back at Lake 3713, we knew we wouldn’t have time to climb Tyndall today as well, not that we had expected that. So, we packed up and moved camp back over the crest near the small lake above Lake 3661.

Here we had some nice views of Mount Tyndall and Williamson.

Unfortunately, the weather continued to worsen, not clear, as the evening came and by the time we went to bed, the tent was flapping around in the wind pretty good. We had tried to select a sheltered spot behind a boulder, but the strategy didn’t really work, the wind was buffeting back and forth. It wasn’t too strong, we knew the tent would be fine, but the noise made it hard to get much sleep. Looking back on it, I think this is the trip that lead to my always packing foam earplugs on future outings.

So we tossed and turned most of the night, the tent blowing away above us, not sure what the next day would hold.

We slept in a bit after not sleeping much the previous night and found cloudy skies in the morning, not a good sign. The weather had closed the door on summiting Mount Tyndall on this trip as well, but we were content to have climbed Williamson and certainly intended on returning for Tyndall soon.

Stormy skies over the Great Western Divide.

We made our way back over Shepherd Pass and out of the wind before an uneventful hike back down to the car.