Basics
Itinerary
Overview
The Quarter Domes are two granite domes located on the valley rim between Half Dome and Cloud’s Rest. They are much less well known than their iconic South Rim cousins, and they take some off-trail hiking to get to, but I would make the bold claim that the view of Half Dome from Quarter Domes is better than from Cloud’s Rest.
Note: Camping on Cloud’s Rest is prohibited. According to the NPS website: “Camping is permitted within 100 feet of a stream, trail or body of water provided that a well established campsite exists and terrain permits no other options. In no case will camping be permitted within 25 feet of a stream, trail or body of water.” Quarter Domes is a half mile off the trail, so it is within the camping guidelines.
The hike starts amongst the crowds at Happy Isles, one of Yosemite’s most popular trailheads. It overlaps the popular Mist Trail + Nevada Fall corridor. The waterfalls are a spectacular sight in spring, and the cold shower from Vernal Fall is welcome on a hot day. Nevada Fall is the destination for most day hikers. The crowds thin significantly beyond it as the trail continues towards Little Yosemite Valley. Little Yosemite Valley (LYV) is a large backcountry campground that serves as a basecamp for many Half Dome and Cloud’s Rest hikers, and also the junction at which some continue down the Merced River valley towards Merced Lake. Our permit was for “Past LYV”, so we kept going on the Cloud’s Rest trail until we reached the elevation of Quarter Domes, around 8.1k feet. Then we hiked off-trail until we reached the valley rim where we had excellent views up and down the valley.
We did this trip over Memorial Day weekend in May 2023. Going to Yosemite on Memorial Day weekend is basically asking for crowds, but I love that there are still ways of finding solitude on the trail when you’re backpacking.
Day 1: Happy Isles to Quarter Domes
It was 3:30 AM and officially the earliest I’d ever left the house for a backpacking trip. I had spent the whole night packing and unpacking, undecided about going on the trip because I had been dealing with stomach issues for the past week. I had only started antibiotics for it just earlier that day. After barely sleeping for 2 hours, I somehow still picked up my backpack and stumbled into my friends’ car, hoping I wouldn’t regret my decision.
We were leaving this early because storm damage had closed our usual entrance (Big Oak Flat) to Yosemite Valley. Going to Yosemite on a long weekend is already asking for chaos. One entrance closure would create an even bigger bottleneck at the remaining ones.
Thanks to our efforts to leave early, the roads were empty. We breezed through the still unstaffed entrance a little after 7 AM, and were parking near the wilderness center before 8 AM. The valley was peaceful, but the wilderness center was bustling with backpackers picking up their permits. This part always takes a lot of waiting around. The rangers wait until a group forms to do wilderness rules and regulations talks. Then the groups line up and the rangers do more talking to each group about their specific itinerary.
By the time we were parking at the trailhead, it was around 10 AM. The trailhead parking was full, so we parked near Curry Village a mile away from Happy Isles. The walk towards Happy Isles trailhead felt like the walk towards the entrance gates of an amusement park or music festival. Everyone was on the same trail with the same destination, Vernal and Nevada Fall. There were so many day hikers that it was stop and go traffic, and our conspicuously large overnight packs made it even harder to navigate the crowds.
The Mist Trail follows the Merced River up towards Vernal Fall. The rivers and waterfalls of Yosemite are a spectacle every spring, but after a record-breaking winter, they were truly astounding to witness—the deafening sound, the mist thicker than rain. It was hard to comprehend the force of that much water coming down even while standing there in person. The flow was so violent that the entire river was opaque and frothy. When the river was pinched between boulders, the water shot upwards as if it were erupting. Seeing water like this made it easier to imagine how it could have carved a place like Yosemite Valley over millions of years.
The air became increasingly wet the closer we got to Vernal Fall. At some point, people started stepping to the side of the trail to don their rain gear.
Even though it was a hot day, we weren’t going through the Mist Trail at its peak without rain gear since we had a night to spend in the wilderness after. I put on a poncho and knee-high gaiters to keep water from running down into my shoes.
I wanted to look up at the waterfall and not just at my feet, but other things demanded my attention, like the sheets of water cascading down the tall rock steps and the crowded, two-way trail. When I did manage to steal a glance upwards, my face was immediately slapped by water and it was difficult to keep my eyes open.
The spray created gusts of wind that flapped my poncho around like crazy and barely kept me dry besides my torso. Maybe that was a feature more than a bug though since the cold mist was refreshing in the hot sun. My waterproof shoes and gaiters helped keep my socks remarkably dry.
We took a break at the top of Vernal Fall. It was extremely crowded—no surprise there. We spread our wet gear over our backpacks, and by the end of our snack munching, my gear had mostly dried. We continued on to Nevada Fall. Nevada Fall is where most day hikers turn around. Many people were lounging and having lunch on the large shelf at the top of Nevada Fall before it tumbles over the cliff.
After Nevada Fall, we left most of the day-hiking crowds behind. The rocky trail gave way to dirt and the trail leveled out for the first time since we left the valley. The roaring of the river faded into the background. The only sounds were of my quiet footsteps over pine needles as we shuffled quickly past the easy terrain before Little Yosemite Valley.
The other 2 times I’ve arrived at Little Yosemite Valley, I saw the signs with relief because I was camping there. This time, we were only halfway done with our day. A nontrivial 2,000 feet of elevation gain lay ahead of us. The trail after Little Yosemite Valley overlaps the trail to Half Dome and the John Muir Trail, and we passed quite a few Half Dome day hikers on their way down. After about a mile, we forked from that trail to the Cloud’s Rest trail and we found ourselves completely alone. There had only been a few early-season trip reports so far as not many people had gone up towards Cloud’s Rest after the big winter.
We left the trail at around 8k, the elevation of West Quarter Dome, and started traversing across the slope. It was pretty straightforward off-trail as far as off-trail travel goes, but we were trying to gain as little elevation as possible so our tired legs didn’t have to work any more than needed. In reality, that was not always doable given the bushes. We were also pressed to find water before camp. Our last refill was from a stream a while ago near LYV. We had banked on coming across another one to fill up for the night, but the trail had been unexpectedly dry. When we finally heard the sound of water, we were probably less than one hundred steps away from it and we found it easily. It turned out to be just a trickle of water—barely a stream, but it was a relief. We saved the coordinates so we could return to it the next day.
We were aiming for West Quarter Dome, but we ended up popping out of the trees closer to East Quarter Dome. The view was everything I had hoped for. It looked similar to the photos I’ve seen of Cloud’s Rest, but arguably more majestic because we were closer to Half Dome so it filled more of the view. West Quarter Dome jutted out and partially covered Half Dome from where we were standing, so Nick and I dropped our packs and went to scout for campsites with a more unobstructed view.
With my pack off, exhilaration replaced exhaustion. I bounded down the slope towards West Quarter Dome, filled with energy. Most of it was steep, but there were some flat spots of gravel here and there. We bookmarked some spots by taking photos of them and ended up finding the perfect spot that had enough space for a few tents.
The rounded slope of West Quarter Dome fell away in front of us before rising up to the granite perch on which Half Dome stood. Subdome still had some patchy snow. Above it was the famous cables section. Both looked unapproachably vertical from this vantage point.
Yosemite Valley extended as far as the eyes could see in both directions. Beyond East Quarter Dome, the valley became more and more shallow as it rose towards Tuolumne Meadows. In the other direction, the darkening valley revealed the winding lights of cars headed out for the day. The quiet that enveloped us made the earlier part of the hike where we were surrounded by hoards of people feel like a distant memory.
Day 2: Cloud’s Rest and Return to Happy Isles
I set a sunrise alarm for the next morning as our camp spot was too good to pass up being awake for sunrise. The sun rises behind Cloud’s Rest and it was cloudy at the horizon, so there ended up being no dramatic sunrise showing, but I thought the pink lighting was still gorgeous.
Today we were going to try to summit Cloud’s Rest before returning to the trailhead. I say “try” because we knew there would be snow and we weren’t sure how much that would slow us down.
After packing up camp, we went to look for the water source we had marked the day before, but it was nowhere to be found. Even though snowmelt streams were pretty much guaranteed to exist, they were far too transient to be reliable water sources. We were mostly out of water at this point and had to bumble around off-trail for a while until we found a new tiny stream to fill up at.
Then we got back on the Cloud’s Rest trail. Since we would be coming down the same way, we stashed most of our pack’s contents off to the side before continuing. The snow coverage started becoming significant at around 8.5k in altitude. Some of the switchbacks were covered and had a pretty steep dropoff on one side, but the well-worn boot tracks made them not too bad. We also put on our microspikes which helped a bit.
There was 90%+ snow coverage after 9k and the direct sun was making the snow very soft. There was also no clear path to follow anymore, so we just headed straight up in the general direction of Cloud’s Rest. It was such a slog. I tried to kick in steps, but the snow was too soft to hold them. I frequently ended up knees-on-snow, and then butt-on-snow because I was tired. We did this until about 9.3k, at which point we were nearing our turnaround time. Two members in our group had also turned back already.
In the interest of time and our sanity, we decided to push on just a bit more so we didn’t come so far for nothing. We looked pretty close to the top of a ridge. On the map, it looked like we would have a view from there. Cloud’s Rest was just further up the same ridge so we figured the view would be similar.
My friend was ahead and got to the top first. I shouted at him trying to ask if the view was good, and he motioned to come. I was probably less than one hundred steps from the top, but the next minute felt like an eternity of trudging.
The view was like a wider-angle version of the view from the Quarter Domes. Half Dome is farther away and smaller. In the other direction, I could see 2 tiny silhouettes of other hikers at the top of Cloud’s Rest. I applauded their resolve in my head.
The way down was much faster and much more enjoyable because I indulged myself in as many glissades as I could. The slushy snow slowed down my slides a lot. To get more speed, I had to stand up repeatedly to get a running start before plopping back down. I only got to glissade for the first few hundred feet down because the trail stopped started traversing to the side, so after that it became more shoe skiing.
It was easy going once we were back on the trail and below the snow line. We still had plenty of miles to go but it was all downhill. My knees ached so much. By the time we got to Little Yosemite Valley and met up with our group, I realized I was feeling really out of it and I had to sit down for a while. It turned out to be minor dehydration. I felt a lot better after chugging some electrolyte water.
After Nevada Fall, we were kind of hoping to take the John Muir Trail back to Happy Isles so that we wouldn’t have to go through the mist storm of the Mist Trail, but the JMT was temporarily closed. The rivers were flowing so high that water was pouring out on to the trail and apparently gushing out from a crack underneath it, so it was closed for safety reasons.
I felt like I got even wetter on the way down the Mist Trail. The wind was gusting from behind so I couldn’t even hold down my poncho. It didn’t matter too much since we were almost back at the trailhead, but it was so cold and the sun had seemingly disappeared for the day. I hadn’t anticipated the day taking as long as it did. We didn’t leave the valley until almost 8 PM and didn’t get home until after midnight. Fortunately, we decided to do a 2 day trip over a 3 day weekend so we still had Monday to recuperate from our strenuous vacation.
At this point, I’ve done every trail out of Yosemite Valley at least once, and a few multiple times, but somehow there’s still more to discover. I didn’t even know about Quarter Domes until a few months ago when I saw a trip report video from another Bay Area-based backpacker. It’s surprising to me how relatively unknown it is given its proximity to Yosemite Valley.
As for the stomach issues? Not the best part of the trip, but I still didn’t regret going.
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