Hiking Half Dome

The Half Dome hike requires a permit. The park only allows 300 permitted hikers per day on the trail, and a permit can only be obtained through a lottery system held every year in March. I applied in early March and was denied.

Fortunately, they also have a secondary daily lottery where 2 days prior to your desired hike date you can re-apply. Through this process they can grant up to an additional 50 permits per day. The daily lottery application period is from midnight to 10 am daily. Who sets these crazy permit rules!?

Since I’m arriving on Thursday and leaving on Monday, that leaves only Friday, Saturday, or Sunday as possible hike days. Based on the historical statistics the park service keeps, Friday is my best chance to obtain a permit.

So Thursday, the morning I was to drive into Yosemite at 4 am and get in line at Camp 4, I woke up briefly at 12:01 am to apply for one of these daily lottery permits.

Later that same morning, sometime shortly after I received a spot in Camp 4, I also received an email successfully granting me a permit to hike Half Dome the very next day. Sweet! It’s all coming together quite nicely I thought.

Are you still following all this? It’s a lot I know. You don’t need to know all this, except I wanted to show the lengths I went to in order to even make this hike happen.

I’m awake. Barely. It’s still dark. And damp. And cold. Maybe 45 degrees. I fumble around trying to get ready in my only slightly warmer tent. Fortunately, I prepared almost everything the night before. I just need to gather everything up, and fill my Camelbak with water.

Shuttle service doesn’t start until 7am, so I unfortunately have no choice but to walk the roughly 3 miles just to get to the trailhead.

Along the way I walk by a meadow and am greeted by a deer.

This feels like a good sign for the day.

7,000 steps later I’ve arrived at the trailhead. Good grief! I could’ve done without that.

I start out on the Mist Trail.

It’s a steady climb alongside the thundering Merced river.

As I continue to climb I’m working up a small sweat. I’m not so bothered now by the cold damp weather.

The climb steepens and the views get more incredible.

Still cold but now in a full sweat from climbing. They don’t call this the Mist Trail for nothing.

How quickly a mist becomes a monsoon! As I climb up past the waterfall I’m now drenched. So now it’s still 45 degrees, I have fully sweat through my inner layers, and now my outer layers are soaked.

“Hey brainiac – that poncho that you just now remembered you packed might have come in handy here.” – My Sarcastic Inner Voice

I forge on in disgust.

The climbing gets even steeper from here, which seems impossible (and yet somehow it does)

Yet more climbing up past Nevada Falls.

5 1/2 miles in now. It starts sprinkling. I pull out that poncho.

I’ve now climbed above the waterfalls and into a wooded section where a dirt trail flattens out. For the first time in over 2 hours of hiking, I’m not climbing. My legs are enjoying the brief reprieve.

It was also at this point that I was naively thinking, or hoping rather, that the majority of climbing was behind me. (hint: Not even close!)

Disclaimer: Not sure if it’s actually enchanted

Climbing begins again. My pace has slowed. My breathing is labored. The haze thickens and the rain picks up.

How much longer before we stop climbing!? This forest section can’t keep continuing like this. It just wont end! My spirits are about as low as my blood sugar. I stop for a snack.

I’m totally out of gas. Visibility is deteriorating. The next 900 feet is a straight up climb. Switchbacks wind up steps carved into the granite. I have to stop and collect myself every 50 feet. The steps ultimately end, and you have to scramble up the rock from there. This is brutal!

Part of me is glad that the visibility is bad, so I’m not distracted or intimidated by the sheer dropoffs I’m climbing next to. My legs are already shaking from fatigue and I know if I lose my focus or balance there is no coming back.

I can’t seem to catch my breathe. My legs are completely exhausted. My hands are cold, stiff, and damp.

Only 400 feet to go. But this is no ordinary 400 feet. From here, it’s an epic 400 foot vertical climb up a sheer granite wall. The only way up is to pull yourself up by these cables chiseled into the rock.

A ranger stopped me earlier during my climb on the Sub Dome. He checked my permit and was advising everyone against climbing the cables.

As you can see, with near zero visibility up here there wouldn’t be anything to see even if I did climb to the top. Plus, the granite and cables would be very slick in these wet conditions making it extremely dangerous.

In fact, an experienced climber died when he lost his grip descending the cables earlier this week in similar wet conditions.

Part of me is glad the decision was taken out of my hands, so I didn’t even entertain any notions of trying to be a hero.

The entire hike I was pretty much resigning myself to the fact that the weather wasn’t going to allow me to complete this hike. I had to play the hand that I was dealt, and today was the day I was permitted to do this hike.

That doesn’t diminish the fact that it’s somewhat demoralizing to go through all the pain and effort of this hike, just to have to turn back in the last 400 feet. Not to mention missing out on all the incredible views along the way. It definitely leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

For some perspective, if this were a beautiful sunny day this is what I’d be experiencing.

So I stay up here next to the cables for a couple minutes to rest, eat a quick snack, and bask in my achievement. But it’s not a comfortable place to camp out. It’s much windier, colder, and even more damp up here, as I’m fully exposed in the clouds. Plus, I feel like if I stay up here long enough I’m gonna somehow fall off the side.

My body is starting to cry out in pain…seemingly from everywhere. My legs feel like rubber. Strike that. If I could feel my legs at all I imagine they’d feel like rubber. They’ve actually gone past the rubbery noodle phase and moved right into the numb state of shock phase.

I’ve now also shut my brain off and put myself in a semi-catatonic state of cruise control. That’s the only defense my body has left to deal with the pain I’m in as I head back down the way I came.

Once I sit down I snap out of my semi-catatonic state and my brain once again starts allowing signals to be received from other parts of the body. And they’re not happy! My feet ache, my low back is on fire, and my legs are screaming. I feel like if I sit for more than 5 minutes I’ll never get up again. I eat a very quick snack then reluctantly soldier on.

Until now I’ve come down the same way I hiked up. At the top of Nevada Falls the trail forks.

Decision time.

I could go back down the Mist trail and get soaked again (even with the poncho). Or I could take a new route down – the John Muir Trail. It’s the drier route, but longer by over a mile. It’s a tough call.

Even though I can’t get down fast enough, I’m so cold and damp I can’t fathom getting soaked again. I choose the longer route. My legs are extremely displeased with the decision.

Another reason to take this new route down is that there are some new sights along the way.

Along this last section, water is cascading down the granite wall onto the stone walkway. In order to avoid getting showered upon, I need to slide myself up against and along the granite wall behind the water coming down from above.

I think you know where this is going…I slip, go down hard, smash my forearm on the stone path, and slide into a pool of cold water. So I took this significantly longer trail simply to avoid getting wet and I’m now soaked. The irony is not lost on me.

Okay – this isn’t fun anymore (if what I was doing prior to this was fun – it’s extremely hard to tell at this point)

Sweet Mother of Pearl! The climb up might be tougher on the legs but the hike down is so much more jarring on my low back, which is now occasionally spasming.

Finally! I feel like how I imagine someone hiking for days thru the desert without water would feel stumbling across an oasis.

Now just a brisk 3 mile walk from here back to Camp 4. Absolutely not a chance! I hop on the next shuttle.

Praise Jesus! I get one of the last remaining open seats on this now packed bus. I collapse into the seat. Finally, the suffering has ended! Seated next to me is a woman carrying an extremely unhappy baby, which now starts screaming into my right ear. Oh what fresh hell is this!?

I spill out of the bus. I almost fall to the ground as my legs have stiffened during the ride. They’ve now reached a new stage. Lets call it – complete shutdown. I could barely stand up, let alone walk. 50 more yards. Just 50 more yards.

As I plunge into my tent, I can’t speak but I muster up a couple of moans and a laugh cry. You know…when you’re completely exhausted, your entire body is in pain, and you want to cry. You even make a face as if you’re about to cry – but all that comes out is a laugh. I know I’ve pushed myself to my limits when the laugh cry makes an appearance.

I lie there and check my Fitbit as it recaps my day:

• 25.5 miles
• 48,000 steps
• 520 vertical stories climbed (and then descended)

Can that possibly be right!? My brain is having a hard time acknowledging the accuracy of these stats. My aching and now seized up legs scream out from below to confirm.

Someone come wake me in 3 days.