Will be staying at Curry Village this weekend. Thinking about trying to cross country ski while there. Folks in our party want to ski in the Valley, but some others thought about going up to Badger Pass. Unable to find rental cross country skis in San Francisco, so probably have to go to Badger to rent equipment anyway. What are the conditions like road-wise and ski-wise? Is it an easy drive from Curry to Badger? - have never been. Are chains required right now? I have them and will bring them, but curious to know if they are needed right now on the roads.

I doubt there will be any snow in the valley, unless the upcoming storm is much colder than forecast, so you will need to head up to Badger. You are always required to carry chains while in the mountains during winter, and you may need to install them to drive to Badger--again, depending on how the storm this week goes. If you don't want to drive, there is a free ski shuttle bus that you can take from Yosemite Lodge to Badger--I think it departs two times in the morning. Badger rents all kinds of cross-country ski gear. The Glacier Point road is groomed almost daily and is the easiest for beginners--the other trails can be trickier to ski, especially if the snow is crusty and they have had a lot of foot/snowshoe traffic.

Badger Pass ski bus schedule.

It picks up from Curry first, the Village, the Ahwahnee, then the Lodge.

Badger Pass Shuttle Schedule



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/16/2016 08:44AM by JustKeepWalking.

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Paris92

Unable to find rental cross country skis in San Francisco, so probably have to go to Badger to rent equipment anyway.

While not in San Francisco, the Berkeley Sports Basement store (but only their Berkeley location) rents cross-country skies and equipment, as does Outback Adventures in Fremont (and I think their new San Rafael location too).

http://www.outbackadventures.com/rentals/ski_snowboard.htm

http://www.sportsbasement.com/rentals/snow/

.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

It was a great weekend. No snow in the Valley really, but we had a great Saturday up at Badger cross country skiing, and went ice skating this afternoon at Curry. We checked out the Firefall two nights also - so-so on Friday, but amazing on Saturday night. An almost full moon was cool too. And little did we know that Saturday night was the last night Curry Village was under the management of DNC. It was like a ghost town when we left at 2:00 pm today. Everything locked up with signs indicating Curry Village would reopen on March 4th. To their credit, in no way did it feel like it was the last weekend of operations. We experienced great service all weekend.

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Paris92
And little did we know that Saturday night was the last night Curry Village was under the management of DNC. It was like a ghost town when we left at 2:00 pm today. Everything locked up with signs indicating Curry Village would reopen on March 4th.

I think you mean that "Half Dome Village" will be opening up on March 4th.

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It sounds like you had a great time. I have stayed at Curry the last weekend that it is opened in the winter and it is a bit strange.

Love the folks at the Curry reservation desk and am glad that they are keeping their jobs. They didn't find out, for sure, until Friday!

This is going to get soooo confusing!

People using the old name and not knowing the new name . . .
People using the new name and not knowing the old name . . .

"So where are you staying? I'm at Curry Village."
__"Oh I've got a tent at Half Dome Village."
"That's interesting. I haven't heard of that. Where is it? Is it anywhere near Curry Village?"
__"I'm not sure where Curry Village is. I'm over under Glacier Point. I look straight up at it."
"Oh so you're over near Curry Village!"
. . .
I wonder how long this'll go on before they figure they're both staying at the same place.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2016 09:34PM by qumqats.

I think there is going to be some confusion especially when you have someone that is used to the old names trying to give information to someone that has never been there before. After going there for almost 30 years, I will find it hard to use the new names without thinking about it. I only hope that this comes to a quick resolution so everything goes back to the old names.

That is good news. I know someone that works at Yosemite Lodge front desk and hope he is safe. I also know several managers and hope that all have jobs.