Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Best dayhike in Yosemite?

Follow-up re Half Dome:

The secret is to hit the trail mid-week in early October, just before they take the cables' support posts down (usually on Columbus Day). At most, there are maybe a dozen hikers on the 300 yards of cables at one time. Makes for a much more enjoyable experience.

Might be a good idea to do Halfdome hike would be during a long weekend .. i was there on the hike during the July 4th long weekend and was expecting huge crowds but was surprised to see that the trail was very less crowded, might be most of the hikers assume that its going to be very crowded and skip on long weekends. You could almost walk on the cables without stopping (if you can). Havent tried other long weekends and so am not sure whether it applies for all of them.

The crowd story though is not really true for the valley though .. had to stand for an hour in the queue to get a pizza after the hike.

I was on the Half Dome trail yesterday. I didn't do the Half Dome hike, but hiked from Cathedral Lakes to Happy Isles and the next day hiked back the same way. So on the first day, I was on the Half Dome trail after the Muir fork around noon.

I was expecting a complete freeway because it was Labor Day weekend. I was shocked that the crowds were relatively tame (operative word here is "relatively.")

From the Muir Fork, 2 miles below Half Dome, to the restroom at the Mist Trail fork, I encountered possibly 150 people. This is a low number, I've seen as many as 300 people in the summer in this section of the trail.

I also noticed that everyone was carrying water, though many looked to be suffering. As always, there was much ridiculous footwear, including multiple examples of flip-flops, Vans tennis shoes and dress sandals. Another great thing was there was very little litter on the trail. I only picked up 2 bottle tops and a couple wrappers from Cliff Bars.

But the lack of crowds was a surprise.

One other thing I have noticed in Yosemite this year which has saddened me. The trash containers in Curry Village and Yosemite Village are constantly overflowing and litter is scattered all around th trash cans. I've noticed that 6-7 times in the past month. I guess park staff is so stretched that they can't empty the trash bins fast enough.

Here is one I did some years ago. Leave Happy Isles and take the JMT up to Nevada Falls. Pay attention to the junction with the Panaorma Cliffs trail on the right as you go up because I turn around at Nevada Falls and go back west and take that trail over to Glacier Point. From Glacier Point I take the 4-Mile trail back to the valley. It's about 12 miles.

Dave, I agree, this is an excellent dayhike.

Another great one is a little longer but arguably even more scenic: Start at the Four Mile Trail on the valley floor. Hike to Glacier Point and then continue with the Nevada Falls hike, then return to the Valley Floor. This is a 19.4 mile dayhike, rather long, but many wonderful views and not crowded if you start early.

This is a recommended hike for mid-October because the heat on the Nevada Falls hike can be intense in the summer.

This is a great thread. I can't wait til next summer so I can try some of these out. I didn't start the thread, but thanks anyway to all the people out there for the recommendations.

z

Candace, it looks like you just described DaveG's hike in reverse. But I don't understand the difference in distances.

I thought the Panorama loop -- Four mile, Glacier Point, Nevada Falls and down to Happy Isles was more of a 12 mile hike.

There can be confusion over the differences between the Mist Trail, the John Muir Trail, and Nevada Fall. When I hiked up the Panorama Trail the end of June I used the JMT. Some other people in our coalition car caravaned up to Glacier Point and hiked down the Panorama Trail. I ran into them just above Illilouette Fall.

To make a long story short, they took the right fork instead of the left fork at the JMT. They went over past Nevada Fall and came down the Mist Trail instead of the JMT. As a result most of the members of the group took over an hour more to come down because some were not prepared for the rocks and steps on the Mist Trail. Ironically they took the shortest route (by 0.1 mile) but did not realize until it was too late that they were taking the hardest route.

The distance from the HI trailhead to Glacier Point is 8.2 miles (0.8 miles to the Vernal Fall bridge, 0.2 mile to the JMT, 1.2 miles up the JMT to Clark Point, another 1.1 miles up the JMT to the Panorama Trail, 0.9 mile up the Panorama Trail to the Mono Meadow trail, another 2.0 miles to Illilouette Fall, and another 2.0 miles to the Glacier Point complex). The Four Mile trail is actually 4.7 miles long. We are talking about 13 miles, not counting the walk from the trailheads to the nearest shuttle bus stops.

I agree with kenny about 20 Lakes Basin - also, add to that (or on the next trip), after you get across Saddlebag Lake, turn left and head up cross-country to Conness Lakes - it is a treat! And if you're more adventurous, traverse the glacier (watch out for the crevasse from which I miraculously escaped), and class 3 to 4 scramble/climb to the ridge and plateau, then straight up to the summit of Conness. You won't be disappointed.

Steve,
I did mess up my distance by 1/2 mile, sorry. I just did this hike last week, but math is not my strong suit.

From the Valley Floor to Glacier Pt. on the 4 miles trail, it's 4.4 miles. From Glacier Point to Nevada Falls it's 5 miles. That's a total of 9.4 miles. Multiply this by 2 and you get 18.8 miles.

The signs in the park say the Four Mile Trail is 4.4, books say anywhere from 4.5-4.8. I've done this hike at least 40 times and definitely think it's 4.4 at the most.

The hike I'm describing doesn't go near Happy Isles. When you get to Nevada Falls, you return up to Glacier Point and then descend on the Four Mile Trail. Hope this makes sense.

As far as a great hike, I just got back from Yosemite and did Half Dome via the Mist Trail completely in the dark. We started at 12:30 A.M. and were on the top by 5:20. We saw noone on the trail and noone on top. Actually, we thought we had the entire summit to ourselves, but it turns out two hikers had came up the night before and slept on top due to some bear activity below the subdome. We were on top for over an hour, enjoyed the sunrise, and made our way back leisurely to the trailhead at Happy Isles. It was pretty incredible to have the entire summit of Half Dome to yourself! On the way up my friends, who hadn't done Half Dome before, kept saying they wished they could see the cables before heading up. I told them it was better NOT to see them because many people get freaked out just at the sight of them. On our way down they agreed! No matter how many times I do Half Dome, I'll always get a rush at the cables!

Gusto

Thanks for all the excellent feedback everyone! There are so many great-sounding hikes here that I definitely want to try when I get the chance.

As for our trip, we ended up just doing the Half Dome night hike that a few of you suggested, since neither of us had been up there before. We were up in Tahoe and drove down Sat night, arriving in Yosemite Valley at 1am. We got to the top about a half hour before sunrise, and there were about 7-8 other folks already up there. Stayed up there for about an hour and enjoyed the sunrise and views, hiked back down to our car around noon and drove back to LA.

It was a great hike and I would definitely recommend it. Doing this hike at night is a wonderful experience, as we felt like we had the whole park to ourselves. We didn't see a single person on the entire hike up until we reached the summit. Conversely, going down we must've passed at least 500-1000 people on their way up.

The only drawback for me was the lack of sleep. I think I will never do a night hike again without getting at least a couple hours of sleep beforehand. I dayhiked Whitney about a month ago on maybe 3 hours sleep, and I felt 10x better on that hike than I did on this one, even though Whitney is a tougher hike. After running around in Tahoe all day and then driving down, I was already pretty exhausted before we even started our hike up Half Dome. I think my excitement before starting the hike masked how tired I was. We did screw up a little coming down and somehow took the wrong trail (hopping off Mist halfway and climbing back up to the JMT), which added distance and elev to our hike, but I would've been completed wiped out even had we stayed on course the whole time.

The cable section was pretty interesting for me. When we came over the ridge leading up to the cables and saw them for the first time, they looked SUPER steep. I think that if it wasn't something that I knew was regularly done by thousands of people, I would've been a lot more scared going up. Even as is, I felt a bit nervous the whole time going up and coming down those things- didn't feel like my shoes ever had a real solid grip on that rock. Did people really use to go up Half Dome with no cables and no equipment? Crazy...

Hey thanks for the report of how your hike turned out. It sounds like you had a fun adventure, even without enough sleep. I personally need to get a good night's sleep or I really don't enjoy myself much at all with outdoor activities when even a little exertion is needed. So at least you did have a good time overall, though I'm sure it took you a few days to recover fully.