Yosemite has recently posted on their website that the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground will be closed temporarily, with limited spaces available in an alternative location for 36 nightly backpackers. No other information or timeline has been provided. Calls to the park were responded to with “Budget Cuts”, and mentions that it may not reopen for the majority of the summer.
Traditionally, the Yosemite Valley Backpackers Campground has accommodated over 100 permitted hikers per night during prime season, providing a place to camp either the night before or after, or during a longer trek. Recently, this number has increased because the Tuolumne Meadows Campground and Backpackers Campsites 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, and/or this closure is concerning:
- Allows backpackers to start and end their trips safely without time constraints.
- 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.
- Giving long-distance hikers (like PCT, JMT, and other multi-day hikers) a place to rest, resupply, and/or celebrate their accomplishments in the popular Yosemite Valley, which offers other conveniences such as showers, shopping, restaurants, and a post office.
- Helps people avoid illegal camping and reduce risks like injury, exhaustion, or unsafe travel.
- 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.
- Many people already have travel plans and purchased wilderness permits because they were otherwise planning to use this campground option.
- Lodging and camping around Yosemite are in short supply, especially at this late hour. 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.
- Wilderness permits must be picked up in person the day before or the day of, yet the resources are not available to allow doing so (campgrounds, public transit, etc.). 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 use these shuttles and pick up your required physical permit the same day.)
- Battling traffic/parking issues to find parking on the day before your permitted trekking day to get your required physical wilderness permit, only to be expelled from that park that evening and to have to return and battle traffic and parking issues yet again the next morning makes little sense.
- Reducing to Camp 4 campsites for only 36 people per night is not enough. Especially when historically, Yosemite has hosted, on average, 200-250 +\- backpackers a night during prime season between all of its Backpacker Campgrounds (when the Tuolumne Meadows Campground was also open).
- Making this announcement after almost the entire backpacking season in Yosemite has now been permitted, and with a No Refunds/Changes/Credits policy within the wilderness permit system, is unethical and unfair.
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 through the facilitation of impactful wilderness experiences. Lasting Adventures has been operating in Yosemite for 30 years and is one of the largest users within the Yosemite wilderness. Lasting Adventures has depended on these campgrounds for our groups at the start and end of our trips. We are looking forward to working with the park to reopen this vital campground for the summer season. We have also volunteered to help manage/service this campground if needed.
Note to our potential clients and those already booked with us: Until the Backpackers’ Campgrounds are reopened, we will use the Yosemite Valley Camp 4 option and/or other campgrounds we have reserved nearby. Despite the possible overcrowding of campsites for the first night in the Yosemite Valley, this change will not affect our wilderness itineraries.