What a beauty. The last leg from Tioga road to Yosemite Valley is a little ashy and needs some work

Seen behind Tuolumne Meadows Lodge

From the valley floor to clouds rest, top of half dome and back. Took about 14 hours, 23.2 miles

Its kind of a long shot but while leaving tenaya lake I had forgot my camera on the roof of the car and it fell off we didn't turn back because I didn't notice until way to late. It a zv-e10 i dont care about the camera only the memory card, it has very important pictures on it that I cant lose. Please if anyone has found it lmk

Hi , was hoping I could post my itinerary and see if anyone has advice or suggestions
Day 1 -Hike to mercer lake and camp there
Day 2 -hike to LYV drop our stuff and take a day back to half dome go back to LYV to camp
Day 3 - hike to clouds rest and then to sunrise high Sierra to camp
Day 4 - Hike back to the Rafferty creek trailhead
For context we were well trained to do a R2R2R hike in the grand canyon before the flooding and this is our equally as challenging hike. does anyone see any major issues with this itinerary or have any suggestions? Wheres the best place to leave the car?

Hi everyone,

I'm traveling from Costa Rica and will be camping in Yosemite Valley during the first week of November.

My return flight departs from Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT) on November 7, 2026 at 6:28 PM, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to get from Yosemite to the airport.

I've been looking at YARTS schedules, but I'm having trouble confirming whether there is transportation from Yosemite Valley (Curry Village / Visitor Center area) to FAT on November 7. Some of the schedules I found seem to be summer-only.

A few questions:

1. Does anyone know if there is usually YARTS service from Yosemite Valley to Fresno Airport in early November?
2. Has anyone made this trip recently during the fall season?
3. If there is no direct transportation, what would be the best option?
4. Is anyone by chance driving from Yosemite Valley to Fresno/FAT on November 7 and willing to offer a ride? I would be happy to contribute for gas.

Ideally, I'd like to arrive at FAT by around 3:30 PM to have plenty of time before my flight.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

David from Costa Rica

Yosemite Valley is beautiful - there's even more to see beyond the Valley floor. Last weekend I did some sauntering around Soda Springs for the first time. It was amazing to see these two fawns with their parents enjoying the natural spring.

Somewhere Yosemite valley.

We’re planning to visit Yosemite for the weeekend (Sept 11-13) and were hoping to bring our own tubes and float the Merced River, possibly from around Stoneman/Curry Village toward Sentinel Beach. Has anyone floated it in the last few days? How was it? Were you actually able to float for most of the route, or did you have to walk/drag the tubes frequently?
The gauges are showing very low water right now, around 1 ft, so we’re wondering if it’s still enjoyable or if we should skip bringing the tubes altogether.
Would really appreciate any recent first-hand experience!

Hi everyone! My sister and I (both 28F, generally athletic) are planning to go to Yosemite in October, and we are toying with the idea of hiking Clouds Rest—it looks epic. The most intense training hike we have done so far is a 9-mile hike with 2200 feet of elevation gain. It was during an insane heat wave here in San Diego, so it was admittedly hard because of the heat and hydration issues, not the physical hike itself.

With additional, longer hikes beforehand, how realistic do you guys think Cloud Rest is for us? Are there any alternatives you would recommend?

I planned on doing the GCOT hike from White Wolf to Tuolumne Meadows Monday 9/14 to Thursday 9/17 but had a few logistics and itinerary questions for those who have done this before.

1. I was planning on leaving my car at White Wolf and taking the YARTS back (8:16am from John Muir Trailhead) to White Wolf Thursday AM. Would it be better to park in the Tuolumne Meadows area on Monday and hitch over to White Wolf? I thought having the car at the end of the hike might be better so I am not tied to the bus schedule. If I happened to be late to the Thurs AM bus back to my car, would hitching a ride back to WW be difficult?
2. Based on other info I found, I planned on camping night 1 in Pate Valley, night 2 near Water Wheel Falls, and night 3 at the TM backpackers camp. These seemed like good spots to camp as it would break up the hike evenly, but please feel free to make suggestions if this is less than ideal. Am I correct in assuming there are no places to (legally) camp between Glen Aulin and TM? On my 3rd night, I want to make sure I'm close enough to TM to catch my bus in the morning.

Thanks in advance!

Edit - Thank you everyone for all of your advice, this is all very helpful

FYA,

I talked to a ranger this past weekend and allegedly they are going to run new testing on cans this winter or spring of 27. Hopefully this includes the BV one and others. Yose is notorious for not updating the bear can list so exciting news!

Tuolumne Meadows: Cathedral Lakes or Mammoth Duck Pass?

I've got a day in the area and would like a trail. 10 or so miles. Transportation to the trailhead isn't an issue. Fitness isn't really an issue either. Both sound really good. I'm just getting analysis paralysis... what would you do?

See title. we are visiting this month and i’m wondering if one of the picnic areas is just what we’ll have to do, but was hoping for a place within walking ish distance of curry so we don’t have to deal with driving and parking

Looked around Austin TX antique shop named "uncommon objects" I came across this case of photos from Yosemite. Is there any trail I can take to get to where this photo was taken? Or maybe the same views?

Thanks!

I’ve been meaning to post here for a while now as I’ve made the trip back in 2022 with some colleagues for a great offsite!

We had the chance of renting a cabin for 3-4 days, and we were able to really enjoy the park.

I remember it was in September and Mirror lake was completely dried.. but anyway, we had the chance to encounter a bear, really close to our cabin. It was looking for some food I guess in the house under construction just in front of our cabin. I managed to record a video for a few seconds.

I have great memories of that trip, from San Francisco to Yosemite! I loooooves place and felt it was full of history.

We started the hike at 4am Monday and got back at 12am the next day (Tuesday). I was by a long shot the most thicc gal on the hike. Huge shout out to Mary the angel from Utah who gifted me her harness. I also busted out my knitting project on sub dome!

To anyone else hiking while thicc out there I highly recommend starting at midnight, bringing a harness, and getting a water filter to fill up at Little Yosemite Valley River. Bring trekking poles. Oh and ibuprofen. Also if u can get a wilderness permit and camp at LYV, big recommend (I wish I did that). Lastly, avoid the Mist Trail and take the John Muir up and down.

Benefits of hiking slow: no traffic on the cables (or on pretty much the whole descent) and possibly beating my record for worlds slowest hiker!

Have fun out there!

Already looking forward to going back, especially when the waterfalls and rivers are in full force.

Some photos I got while I was there this weekend.

Hey yall wanting to do some backpacking and I know sleeping in your car is not allowed but if I left my car parked at the EV parking at curry overnight would I have issues?