Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Half Dome yesterday

I successfully climbed Half Dome yestrday and I was struck by something I saw. Remembering back to the accident earlier this year and everyone crying about regulation/safety I was heartened to see some people actually do something on their own. On my down climb I counted six people using safety harnesses and clips on the cables themselves. Didn't take a ranger to do it or regulation. They did it on their own. Surely this oughta give Ken and others some home that *some* people (obviously not myself since I dont use them) have common sense and exercise their due dilligence.

My apologizes if this isn't news worthy, but this was the first time I actually saw this. And for those keeping score, I succeeded on Half Dome 5 hours up 5 hours down. Need to figure out why my body started giving up on me with about 1.5 to 2 miles before home on the down climb.

SeanB

PS. Cable traffice was *extremely light* yesterday. So those 5 or 6 people was about half to third of the people on that up climb

I am amazed regarding your report of low traffic. I went up last year on a Saturday in August. It was very slow going up the cables--4 abreast, and stopped in all four "lanes."

Coming down was worse. It took 45 minutes to an hour due to congestion. People were starting to panic, being stuck on the face of the mountain unable to move. There was a 10 year old kid in front of me that got separated from his group. The kid totally iced up. I talked him down, coaxing him to each post so he could stop a rest at the 2X4s bracing the posts. It was awful. When we finally got down to the base of the cables (at about 2:00) there was literally 200 people in line to go up!

After that experience I determined I would never go up to Half Dome again.

It's encouraging to hear that the crowding at the cables was less...maybe the "fad" has died down a bit, or maybe the news of crowding or temperature has slowed things down a bit.

I'm not a fan of clips and harnesses on those cables, but if it makes folks feel safer, and they don't cause congestion, that's great that they're being careful. For the ones that force unwilling, too-young kids up the cables, I'm sure it's a good thing especially. Not as good as leaving the kids behind to do kid things until they're old enough to WANT to go up HD, but good nevertheless.

Ten hours is pretty quick, at least if you're including your time at the top. If that's just hiking time, it's pretty reasonable, and feeling tired on the return is normal (except for the few that figure Half Dome is an "easy" hike, unlike us mere mortals 8^). We're usually dragging by the time we get past Nevada Fall, and ready for it to be over. If you figure out a way to eliminate that and be zippy and refreshed the whole distance, let us know...8^)

Well keep in mind, this was a Sunday, and it was about 11am to noonish. By the time I started my departure it was about 12:30 to 1pm and it still wasn't that bad. All told I encountered only about 4 or 5 people going up, maybe about 15 going down.

My travel time didn't include time spent on the summit which was about an hour. I hit the trail head at 550am and got back to my car around 450am (not including that longish walk to the lot). I probably could've done it a hair quicker as I said if I didn't have to stop so blasted frequently in the last 1.5 to 2 miles of the return trip. Basically the body started giving up on me on junction where you can keep going JMT or take this branch down toward Vernal Falls itself. I figured, two miles left, I got this made... riiiiight. Leg muscles suddenly couldn't take the pounding any more and I had to stop about every 15 to 30 minutes. Weird thing was hydration wasn't an issue. Only thing I can think of is that maybe I need to sleep more before the hike (which is a problem because I get too excited to do these things and can't sleep), or force myself to eat more food along the way.

Now I did encounter one of these kids going up on that harness I referred to and I swear this kid was a machine. I could tell from the look on his face that he was pretty comfortable and he moved up those cables with relative ease. I was quite amazed. The other people I encountered with clips were also moving up with relative ease. This was just an all around different experience from last year.

Hey Central-

I think Saturdays are just plain bad news from everything I've heard. The two times I've climbed Half Dome were both Sundays and both times were low to moderate traffic (certainly no traffic jams or a wall of humanity on the cables). If you manage to catch it Sunday before say noon to 1pm, you should encounter lower traffic. Certainly not anywhere near the rat race you described. I think even Yosemite's site is encouraging people to stay away from Saturdays and holidays (struck me that they didn't say weekends, just Saturdays).

So I guess if you're able, I'd say give it a go on Sundays and try to be on the cables early and see if that helps out some.

For what it is worth, I climbed HD a week ago Friday, August 10th. My buddy and I were lucky enough to be the first ones on the cables in the morning - we got to the base around 8:30 a.m. -and after summitting and spending about an hour and a half on top we only had to pass about 5 climbers going down the cables. Great experience for a first timer like me, as I have seen and heard horror stories about the congestion. Did not see anyone clipping in....

For the record, it took us 4 hours 14 minutes to get to the top and 6 hours coming down. GREAT hike, and one I will definitely do again. Just wish there was more water flowing....