UPDATE: Yosemite has announced that the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground will be fully open in 2025!
In April of 2025, Yosemite posted on its website that the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground would be closed temporarily, with limited spaces available in an alternative location for 36 nightly backpackers. No other information or timeline was provided. Calls to the park were responded to with “Budget Cuts” and mentions that it may not reopen for most of the summer. Lasting Adventures responded by seeking public and local government officials’ support that same week, and our efforts paid off. Yosemite officials responded by announcing that the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground will be open as usual and with no restrictions.
Traditionally, the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground has accommodated well over 120 permitted hikers per night during prime season, providing a no-hassle, no-reservation-needed, and guaranteed location for valid backpackers in Yosemite who need the convenience of a campsite the night before and/or night after their wilderness trip. Recently, this number has increased because the Tuolumne Meadows Campground and Backpackers Campgrounds have been unavailable due to a redevelopment project. This project will continue through most of the 2025 season, leaving the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground under continued higher demand and the only open Backpackers Campground, other than at Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, which is severely out of the way and lacks public transit options.
Why the Backpackers Campgrounds are essential:
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- The Backpackers Campgrounds offer a no-hassle, no-reservation-needed, and guaranteed location for valid backpackers in Yosemite who need the convenience of a campsite the night before and/or night after their wilderness trip.
- Allows backpackers to start and end their trips safely without time constraints.
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- All other Backpackers Campgrounds are otherwise closed for 2025 until further notice.
- The Backpackers Campgrounds offer hikers a chance to acclimate at higher elevations the night before their trips.
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- Giving long-distance hikers (like PCT, JMT, and other multi-day hikers) a place to rest, resupply, and/or celebrate their trip in the popular Yosemite Valley, which offers other conveniences such as showers, shopping, restaurants, and a post office.
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- Helps people avoid illegal camping and reduce risks like injury, exhaustion, or unsafe travel.
- This campground has also been ideal for sick or injured people who might have to leave their wilderness trip early, providing an often-needed place to rest after hiking out of the wilderness.
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- The backpacker’s campsite offers a good location to camp the night before catching the early morning buses from the Valley and to the numerous Yosemite wilderness trailheads.
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- Lodging and camping around Yosemite are in short supply. Finding ways to commute from random lodging and camping sites into and out of the park to trailheads, and/or to the early morning Valley-based hiker shuttles, is a massive hurdle in itself, if not impossible.
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- Wilderness permits must be picked up in person the day before or the day of and the Valley Backpackers Campground provided a perfect location for all of these hurdles to be cleared logically, the day prior, shops to pick things up last minute, and public transportation options to get you to most trailheads on the day of your permit. (Note that these trailhead shuttles depart before the Wilderness Permit office opens, making it almost impossible to both use these shuttles and pick up your required physical permit the same day.)
Lasting Adventures is a 501(c)(3) public benefit non-profit with a mission to foster environmental stewardship, teach responsible recreation, and provide opportunities for personal growth by facilitating impactful wilderness experiences. Lasting Adventures has been operating in Yosemite for 30 years and is one of the largest users within the Yosemite wilderness. Like tens of thousands of backpackers every summer season, Lasting Adventures has depended on these campgrounds for our groups at the start and end of our trips. We are grateful that the Yosemite administration heard the concerns and will now have the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground open as usual.