The day before my good buddy and I woke up bright and early to wait at the ranger station in Yosemite Village two hours before it opened in hopes of getting the evasive, hard-to-get Half Dome / backpacking permit. We had been a little worried that our hopes of climbing up and camping on the Friday after the 4th of July might make it tough for us to acquire one, but much to our surprise, there was only one other person waiting before we got there. I suppose it was 6am, but still, it's easy to play head games with yourself and build up demand and lessen supply in your mind when you want something.
At 8am, a ranger showed up and let us in and inquired about our plans. We told her and she gave us a slip and told us to come back in an hour after she had handed out the rest to the other people who had shown up after us. We got breakfast next door and an hour later, we showed up with everyone else and the group was given a brief run through of the dos and don'ts of backpacking in Yosemite. Minutes later, we walked away with a permit. The rest of the day was spent relaxing by the Merced, knowing full well that to get to Half Dome for sunrise, we'd need to start at midnight.
The refreshingly cold Merced took some warming up to, but was very welcome.
We called it an early evening around 6 or 7pm. I'm not sure about Brian, but even though I'd done this hike before, I struggled to fall asleep because I'd not hiked it for sunrise and I was excited. Eventually I calmed myself and was able to sleep. Around 11:45pm, we set out for the Yosemite Valley trailhead parking lot, parked our car and set out up the Mist Trail.
The hike up to Half Dome can be boiled down into just a few parts: (1) the Mist Trail which is characterized by a couple miles of grueling incline up granite steps that goes by two waterfalls, (2) Little Yosemite Valley, which is long and flat and a nice break from climbing, (3) he climb up through the woods to the Sub Dome switchbacks, which is basically just more climbing, (4) the Sub Dome switch backs, which are exposed granite switch backs that make you just want to be there and (5) the cables, which everyone knows.
Normally, the Mist Trail is an incredible trail that should be enjoyed under the aid of the sunlight, but since we were doing this hike in the beginning of July, I cannot stress enough the advantage of doing this at night when it's cooler. Yosemite Valley can get really hot in the summer and even at midnight Brian and I were in full sweats nearly a mile in.
Vernal Falls and the Mist Trail at night. This isn't from the night of the hike. I went back the next night to capture this as we were in a time crunch to catch sunrise on the way up.
Once you complete the Mist Trail, passing Nevada Falls, you're welcomed by the long, mostly flat Little Yosemite Valley portion of the hike. I wanna say Brian and I reached this area around 1:30/2:00am. Many people get permits to camp out in this stretch as it cuts the hike in half and provides a much easier approach to the summit instead of doing it in one fell swoop. Brian and I (mostly me) however, had (somewhat maniacal) goals to be met - hike to Half Dome for sunrise with our bags and continue further up towards Cloud's Rest and camp just below at Quarter Dome.
As we hiked by tents that were littered along the way, we'd occasionally hear the ruffling of the inhabitants, waking to follow suit on the voyage up to the summit. Having been hiking in pitch black for several hours at this point and fatigue setting in, the knowledge that others would soon be behind us entered my mind and I felt a completely unnecessary competitive need to summit before them. This, on top of the need to see sunrise at the top, in turn pumped me full of adrenaline and kept me going.
The third part of the hike after Little Yosemite Valley, in my opinion, is the hardest. It's not necessarily the most physically demanding, but at this point you are 3/4 of the way into the hike, a little tired especially if you are trying to summit at sunrise (it's probably 4-5am at this point) and you are just hiking up through dense forest. There's not too much to look for stimulation and it's easy to just want to get it over with. As we were nearing the end of this section, the pitch black sky was beginning to subside and the tops of the trees were becoming visible without the aid of our headlamps. Gradually the trees gave way to bald granite and we found ourselves at beginning of the Sub Dome segment.
Generally speaking, any time you hike up to Half Dome, there'll be a ranger or two checking permits at the beginning of this section. Since we started so early, they were not year there, so we continued on. At this point we no longer needed our headlamps and I was becoming irrationally anxious that Brian and I hiked all this way just to barely miss sunrise. We trudged ahead, up the granite steps, racing the clock as the eastern sky, filled with a thick layer of highly elevated clouds, was gradually becoming warmer in color.
Brian, pack and all, climbing up the granite steps to Sub Dome.
Brian and I reached Sub Dome at 5:30am with about 18 minutes to spare before the sun crossed the horizon. Taking our bags off felt so god damned good. Normally I would have taken a seat to rest, but the sky was literally on fire and I knew full well I had zero time to waste.
Putting our bags down felt so good.
The view east from Half Dome was absolutely unbelievable. I don't think we could have asked for better sunrise. The entire sky from north to south looked like it was on fire.
Someone get a hose! The sky over Cloud's Rest is burning down.
Feeling invigorated from the excitement and bewilderment of what we had just seen, we reclaimed ourselves and continued on up the last remaining segment of the Half Dome hike. This is the section that makes this hike so popular, the cables. It is HIGHLY advised that you bring gloves for this part as the 400' of cables will absolutely shred your hands if you don't. In my experiences climbing the cables, there has been a pile of gloves at the start, but I would not bank on that.
The Half Dome hike has become a very popular hike and in doing so, the cables at times can get extremely congested with people. That is another benefit of hiking when we did as they were empty and Brian and I could ascend at our leisure. We were also going up with our packs. The quarter finals of the World Cup were going to be played starting at 7am and we were planning on trying to take naps and stream it with the cell service we hoped to acquire at the top.
Two tickets to cable town.
When you get to the top, you feel all the emotions of a quality summit. Fatigue mixed with the adrenaline of finishing mixed with a "holy shit, look in every direction." It feels great and it's completely natural to scramble around to take pictures of everything. On this particular go around, I went pretty heavy on the hot dogs or legs style shot.
Brian out on "The Visor" with my hot dogs or legs.
Once we got our fill of pictures, we found a nice place to set up our pads and veg out for a couple hours. Service was spotty, but we were indeed able to get the France vs. Argentina game on our phone.
Brian and I chilling. Hard.
An poor attempt at a picture of France beating an underwhelming Argentinian side in the World Cup.
We napped for a while, regaining some much needed energy for the rest of our day. You see, Brian knowingly/unknowingly signed up for a pretty rigorous campaign. Getting up to Half Dome was just 2/3 of the piece of the pie as I had plans to camp close to Cloud's Rest so we could watch sunrise up there the following morning. At around 9:30am as more and more people started to appear at the top, we collectively decided to head down to avoid the mess of the increasingly crowded cables as best we could.
A strategic way to go down is to go on the outside of the cables which allows you to use both arms and have a more controlled position.
Close up of the cable and how steep the grade is at parts.
Another benefit of going on the outside is being able to avoid the congestion on the inside.
One last look at Half Dome before we carried on our way.
Once we reached the base of Sub Dome, we were greeted by the rangers that had not been there before. They checked us for our permit which I happily provided and we continued back down towards the Half Dome / Cloud's Rest trail split. This was around 2 miles. Then the hardest part of our day began. As the sun was getting higher in the sky, so too was the temperature that we had started so early to beat. It was hot which made every step with our bags and our tired legs more difficult. The only two things we had left to do in this day, and it was before noon at this point, was reload on water and find our campsite.
Being early July, the water sources up where we were were pretty few and far between, but near the Cloud's Rest trailhead, we were able to find a spot in the Sunrise Creek that had a decent flow that we could filter. We were able to replenish all of our camelbaks, took a nice break and then trudged on.
Alone, this portion of the hike would have been no sweat. Our campsite was only a little over 2 miles and about 1,500' of elevation gain, but because of the factors I just mentioned, it felt like an eternity. The backbreaker part were the switch backs that, per usual like a boss in a video game, were the last hump to get over. Soft dirt that reflected every bit of heat the sun shot at it right back on us toasted our bodies and well, let me tell you, it was enjoyable. I'm pretty certain Brian wanted to kill me. But! Somehow, someway, we found it in ourselves to push forward and made it to our eventual campsite in the early afternoon.
I don't think I've ever seen Brian this happy.
The campsite was epic. Incredible views south, west and north with an immediate 3,000' or so cliff down to the valley just next to us. The most notable thing for me was the east-to-west view of Half Dome and the rest of the valley. The reason I say this is that it requires almost no effort to see Half Dome or the valley from west-to-east (Tunnel View, Glacier Point) so the effort in getting to this vantage point made it very easy to appreciate.
Now that we had found our campsite, it was lunch time and then nap time. I will say, it feels weird having done everything you needed to do by the early afternoon and kind of being forced to just relax, but that's what we did until around 8pm when it was time for sunset. Being as it may, it was the week of July 4th so we may or may not have put on American flag leggings and romped around in them to show our display of patriotism.
Hey Half Dome, how do you like these American vibes?
As 8:00pm neared, we prepared dinner for a nice cliff side sunset meal and found a nice spot to enjoy.
Our dinner spot rocked. Get it?
Then, as the sun went below the horizon, we were treated to another spectacular display in the sky. It was an absolutely incredible ending to an already amazing and fulfilling day. The sky turned a brilliant pink and Brian and I ran around with our cameras in our American flag leggings like little children snapping off shots of joy.
I've always maintained that Half Dome looks like a dolphin emerging from the water. Thoughts?
Brian looking on patriotically at a sky of fire and Yosemite Valley below.
Our epic campsite.
After the sun went down and our bedding was set Brian called it a night. I used what little energy I had left to attempt to do a little astro, but finding the right composition sometimes requires effort that at this point my body was unwilling to give.
Star beginning to poke their heads out as the sun went down.
Our nightlights for the evening.
Looking back on this hike. It was an absolutely incredible experience. Would I do it again? Absolutely! Is it for the faint of heart? Absolutely not. If you decide to, BE PREPARED. Lots of water, lots of food and make sure you start at the right time. I had my Strava app running from start to finish and the stats were over an elapsed time of 14:13:34, we had a moving time of 7:05:54 and hiked 15.3 miles with 7,409' of elevation gain. Beast of a day.
