Glacier Point Ski Hut

Anyone have experience with this magical looking place? 10.5 mi cross-country ski through Yosemite backcountry to hot cocoa, dinner, and a bed...sounds too good to be true. I just made reservations for late February.

Ostrander Ski Hut looks great too, but my wife isn't interested in the downhill/alpine skiing part, which seems to be what it's known for.

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redpakotasea
Anyone have experience with this magical looking place?

Only during the other three seasons, when its opened as the Glacier Point Gift Shop & Snack Stand.
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Thought I'd post an update with some photos of my trip...spent the 17th and the 18th with the wifey at the Glacier Point Ski Hut.

This was our second time cross-country skiing and the trip out was fairly easy (though the icy conditions resulted in a few bruises). It took us about 5 hours on the way out with a leisurely lunch and 30 minute stopover at Washburn point (roughly 3.5 hours on the way back). The location of the hut is amazing with views of Tenaya Canyon, Half Dome, and the area beyond Little Yosemite Valley through the windows. Glacier Point itself is about a minute walk away and it's not uncommon to find that you have the lookout entirely to yourself. Sentinel Dome is less than an hour away and the hut has snowshoes to use if conditions are right (the last bit of the climb would be tough to do with XC skis). The hut was more luxurious than expected. It's split into three sections, with 4 big couches around a wood-burning stove in the center...the place is heated to a cozy temperature (could probably get away with a light top bag in place of a real sleeping bag). The center section is flanked by the the sleeping area (roughly 20 bunks) on the left and the dining room on the right. Compost toilets are in the back. And though the place doesn't have running water in the winter, I was surprised to find that it does have electricity. Food was surprisingly good too...the new hut keeper works in the kitchen at the Ahwahnee outside of the winter months. Dinner consists of an appetizer, wine, main course, and dessert. It was great to meet friendly folks and trade stories around the fire with a cup of wine and good food. I'd definitely recommend it...particularly to anyone who might otherwise have trouble getting their partner to join on a winter trip.

Ski Hut


Clark range view from GP road
















Sunrise from ski hut


Mount Hoffmann at sunrise




From Sentinel dome




Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2013 10:02AM by redpakotasea.

Awesome. So nice when people come back and say they actually went thru with it.
Excellent

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Beautiful! I love the night time photos! I've wondered how these are done. Do you take a variety of different long exposures and hope to get one that is good. This sounds really ignorant, but I wouldn't know how to begin to take a pic like that, and I would love to do so.

^Thanks.

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Frank
Do you take a variety of different long exposures and hope to get one that is good.

Pretty much...the focus is tough to get right with night shots. There are some necessities: low noise, high iso camera (mine is an old Canon 5D...see dxomark.com for comparisons...full frame cameras fare better in low light) and a lens with a wide aperture (f/1.4 is ideal). Unfortunately, these lenses get very expensive (see Canon's 24mm f/1.4L)...the only one affordable to me was the 50mm which has a much more narrow angle of view and quite a bit of distortion when wide open...fortunately it's great for other things too (low light, portraits, accentuating your subject by blurring the backbround). The first two night shots I posted are with a wide angle lens (17mm) that is not particularly fast (f/4). Any camera can do extended exposures, but there's way to figure out the max exposure you can take before you see star streaking from the earth's rotation (something like 600/focal length = 600/50mm = 12 sec for me). I tried 13 and 15 sec and could start to see minor streaking in the latter.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/20/2013 09:30PM by redpakotasea.

Thanks! Hopefully someday I'll have the equipment to make such a photo. Was there a lot of adjustments to the photo afterwards (photoshop, etc)? The nighttime photo looking up Tenaya Canyon seems to have better color, sharpness, contrast than the daytime one. It's not exactly what I would have naively expected. They are beautiful photos!

^With the night photos, I did some post-processing in Photoshop (adjusting levels and/or contrast...still a novice here). I agree about the night photos of Tenaya...the bright snow and granite at midday are not ideal for colorful/contrasty pictures.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2013 10:19AM by redpakotasea.

I've been there a few times, although I've taken the harder (but cheaper) options of snow camping and doing the round-trip in a day. I cannot comment on the hut since I have never been there, but the setting is AMAZING. Both times, I had Glacier Point all to myself, which is amazing in itself... Staying overnight is definitely a better option thanks to the sunset and sunrise. You should have a blast!

The actual 10.5 mile cross country trip is fairly easy and pleasant (the "road" is fully groomed and you can use the tracks), although you don't get nice views until about half-way (views of the Clark Range) and at the end. If you have time and feel like it, I would also recommend a side-trip to Sentinel Dome and/or Taft Point (although those are not groomed and Sentinel Dome might require skins depending on conditions and/or your skill level).

Have fun!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/29/2012 10:08PM by webenji.

With a wilderness permit can you camp at Glacier Point? if so, where do you set up camp?

How would you even get there?
Hike/shoe/ski on the road from Badger
Ledge Trail, steep and cold
4-mile trail, although they close the trail in winter, I guess because of that exposed section at the top that must fill in and ice up
Panorama trail, a bit on the long side

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qumqats
With a wilderness permit can you camp at Glacier Point? if so, where do you set up camp?

Same as Dewey ... you can't camp right AT the point... but you can camp close.
Where the fire pit is I would say is fine.

(I'll assume you're joking about 4 Mile and Ledge)
(I've been denied permits up 4 Mile when it was closed)

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chick-on
Same as Dewey ... you can't camp right AT the point... but you can camp close.
Where the fire pit is I would say is fine.)

There is a map for the no camping areas in the park's compedium. You can see it online under Laws & Policies. The maps are at the end.

Here is the map for Glacier Point. Looks like the fire pit is officially off limits.


I added the Dewey point one too.

Are any of the vault toilets at GP left open during winter?

Thanks Buster. Hadn't noticed the maps before and I've only camped at Dewey and Crocker from Badger Pass.
Maybe instead of busting own trails this year over xmas we'll go to Glacier Pt. area.

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As chick-on already said, you cannot camp at the point. I remember going with the next-best option in terms of views by camping at Washburn Point (although, I must admit I do not know how "legal" that was - the Park Ranger I talked to did not say it was off-limit and it is not listed as one of the "forbidden" points on the nps website).

All of my winter traveling to Glacier Point (I have been doing it at least once a year in the last 3 years) has been on the groomed road from Badger Pass using Xcountry skis, so I cannot comment on other approaches.

What's the deal with water out there? If you're day-tripping or some dirtbag in a tent, will they share?

Contact the cross-country ski school at Glacier Point. I haven't checked on their program this year, but normally they run overnight trips out to Glacier Point, and have beds set up for their patrons inside the concession building pictured above. I took my wife on one of those trips, since otherwise she would never have gone that far.

As far as I know, only the ski school and the rangers have access to that building in the winter. I'm sure that the water spigots are shut down and drained in the winter, and so is the well head. Any water would be from melting snow on a stove, so I doubt whether any would be available to non-patrons. Of course, if you are doing winter camping, you had better have some way of melting snow yourself. In any case, the ski school doesn't run trips every day, so expect to find the building to be locked up, unless the rangers or ski school tell you otherwise.

Where there's a buck to be made:
http://www.yosemitepark.com/glacier-point-hut.aspx

(it's run the same as Ostrander)
(and clicking on the link will make it obvious where the original photo post came from)

Another note about winter camping... what I was told when getting wilderness permit
from Badger A Frame was to not camp where people normally camp in summer.
I can surmise why this is... but it shouldn't be since you are suppose to dig down to
dirt to do ur business.

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chick-on
Another note about winter camping... what I was told when getting wilderness permit
from Badger A Frame was to not camp where people normally camp in summer.
I can surmise why this is... but it shouldn't be since you are suppose to dig down to
dirt to do ur business.

Huh? Unless you carry a jack hammer, the stuff will still sit right there on top of frozen ground during the snow melt.

Maybe they will eventually have a "carry it out" rule, like they have in the Utah canyons. Otherwise, do your winter camping far away from any trails and summer camp sites.

I simply am stating what I was told. I thought it was ridiculous and simply said "ok, sure".

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When we went to Dewey last winter, we were each handed a WAG bag and instructed to carry EVERYTHING out.

You are not supposed to have a fire in winter, period, by the way. That would lead to people cutting live trees up since the downed stuff is under snow at this point.

I remember being told at the A-Frame to avoid places with heavy summer day-use.

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wherever
I took my wife on one of those trips, since otherwise she would never have gone that far.

Similar situation here...my wife did great on a 5 night backcountry trip in Glacier this past August, but she's never winter camped and is not keen on the idea of camping in the snow.

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wherever
As far as I know, only the ski school and the rangers have access to that building in the winter.

You can also do self-guided trips, which aren't cheap, but still a helluva lot less expensive than the guided trip.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/02/2012 10:24AM by redpakotasea.

As I had previously mentioned, some just fly in: http://yosemitenews.info/forum/read.php?3,52342,52347#msg-52347



(Seriously, most ski or snowshoe in from Badger Pass)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/30/2012 02:56AM by plawrence.

Cool pic of Ostrander ski hut.