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[Yosemite]

2 day overnight trip in may

Travelling to and visiting Yosemite National Park. How to get there, what to see or do, and other Yosemite trip advice.

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2 day overnight trip in may

Postby Ales » Thu Feb 17, 2011 2:04 pm

Hi there,

Two friends and me are planning to visit San Francisco in may this year. We want to spend two days in Yosemite, sleeping in a tent in the wild.

I've already found that we need a wilderness permit for that - but there are a few other questions left:

Which route to choose? Since the cables won't be up, we won't be able to get up to half dome, right? Which route would make sense for a two day hiking trip, with a night in the wild in between?

On the form for the wilderness permit, it says that we should list a spot where we want to sleep. This can be really just a rough location?

Thank you very much :)

Bye,

Ales
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Postby AlmostThere » Thu Feb 17, 2011 3:14 pm

You need to look at the Yosemite website and a map for a bit, because there are very specific rules in Yosemite. Some trailheads you must be 4 miles from the trailhead - some the limit is shorter. Some areas such as the area around Glacier Point and Half Dome there are a bunch of camping restrictions. All of this is explained in great detail at nps.gov/yose in the wilderness pages.

In May, Tioga Road will be closed, Glacier Point Road will probably open very late in the month, and so you need to look at the page with trailhead listings by location closely. You won't be able to access many of them until the plowing of the pass is finished.

You'll probably be walking in snow patches wherever you go over 6-7000 feet. Which is pretty much everywhere.

You do need to list your first night location. They ask for it because they want to know you understand the rules on where that first night can be. It can't, for example, be anywhere between Happy Isles trailhead and Little Yosemite Valley. It can't be on the Panorama Trail. It can't be within two miles of Little Yosemite Valley campground - you must be inside the designated ground within Little Yosemite Valley, or two miles up either trail, toward Merced Lake or toward Clouds Rest/Sunrise, or Half Dome.

You'll also want to review food storage rules and follow them closely if you would like to eat your food instead of feeding - and potentially contributing to the death of - a bear.
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Postby Ales » Sat Feb 19, 2011 4:42 am

Thank you very much :)

Do you have a route recommendation? Something someone should have seen, when he is only able to be in the park for two days?
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Postby AlmostThere » Sat Feb 19, 2011 8:49 am

If this is the first time in Yosemite, I wouldn't suggest backpacking at all. I'd tell you to stay somewhere in the valley (especially given the limited options this time of year, otherwise I'd tell you to head for Tuolumne Meadows) and day hike to Vernal/Nevada Falls and Yosemite Falls.

Camp 4 is first come/first serve walk in sites and you'd still be sleeping in a tent. Likewise if you stayed in Upper/Lower Pines, or in Housekeeping camp - Housekeeping it would be their tent, not yours, but a tent nevertheless.

If you really only have the two days, your chances at a walkin permit for backpacking shorten up your time on the trail a lot - the wilderness office is open mid-morning now. So by the time you get the permit and get a shuttle to the trailhead you've got half a day to get to camp. Not knowing how fast you hike, or how much you plan to carry... I couldn't tell you how hard it will be for you to do that, since all trails out of the valley are a pretty steep elevation gain, and those are hard climbs even for those of us who backpack a lot.

I would maximize your time in the park seeing the big sights that tourists travel from all over the planet to see - the valley is spectacular in spring - instead of trying to sort out the details of backpacking for less than 48 hours.
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Postby Ales » Sat Feb 19, 2011 11:39 am

Ah, okay. Sounds reasonably. Maybe we will be able to get to the park twice, once just for a day and once for two days. This way we could get the permit on the first day.

I feel that sleeping in a tent somewhere in the wild will result in a complete different experience than sleeping in a camp, don't you think?

We have some epxerience in climbing, but I wouldn't say that we are professionals ;) Same applies to backpacking. Thank you again very much for help.
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Postby AlmostThere » Sat Feb 19, 2011 11:43 am

Ales wrote:I feel that sleeping in a tent somewhere in the wild will result in a complete different experience than sleeping in a camp, don't you think?

We have some epxerience in climbing, but I wouldn't say that we are professionals ;) Same applies to backpacking. Thank you again very much for help.


If you were anywhere but Yosemite with two days, that would be true. But it's Yosemite, and to be "in the wild" you really do need more than two days... You are not truly alone in Yosemite until you a) visit one of the less popular parts of the park and b) get two days' hike from a trailhead.

You are diminishing the number of people by going well before summer. But you're not going to be alone. what happens is: people want to go, get permits for May because they are available, show up, hike up the trail to snowline, and camp. When our group dayhiked to Chilnualna Falls, we found a small tent city - snowline was just above the falls, none of them knew how to navigate without a trail, so they all just stopped hiking and camped.
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