Hardin Flat Road

Camp Review

• We found a dispersed campsite off of Hardin Flat Road. The site was flat and it was an established campsite with a fire ring.

• There was no one within eye sight and although the site was right next to the road, it felt like we had acres of land to ourselves.

• There were insects around but honestly, not that many given that it is almost the end of June.

• Because of the lack of traffic on this road, the site was quiet. The loudest thing I heard after parking was an owl hooting nearby. In the morning we heard one car passing and hundreds of birds.

What I Learned

• I relearn this lesson all the time, which is that luck comes to those who are prepared. I had scoped out this area for dispersed camping a couple of years ago, so when I needed to find a campsite on the north side of Yosemite, I knew exactly where to go. And by luck, on a busy Yosemite weekend, we found a huge dispersed camping site just for us.

 

What Happened?

After an amazing day at Yosemite, we weren’t sure exactly what we wanted to do the next day. On the drive out of Yosemite Valley, I made an impulsive change to the plans that Cassie was fine with. Instead of climbing in the valley or hiking in South Yosemite area, we would hike around the Hetch Hetchy area.

I quickly thought up of places we could sleep at and we decided to check out Evergreen and Hardin Flat Road after dinner. When I had researched dispersed camping spots near Yosemite, these were the locations that others had sworn by. On the way, we stopped quickly by Evergreen Riad and found a private, but sloping site that we could use if we could not find any better campsite.

We had a solid dinner at The Lucky Buck and drove straight to Hardin Flat Road while there was a bit of daylight. After a few miles of seeing pullouts, fancy (and not so fancy) campgrounds, we found our lucky spot and quickly backed into it. Sleep arrived quickly.

The next morning, we woke with the singing of birds and we soon were headed to our hike at Hetch Hetchy.