Yosemite Wilderness Permits in 2022

Looks like it's back to the future for wilderness permits in Yosemite.

The new policy for 2022 manages to avoid some of the pitfalls of the last couple of years. Only 60% of the permits for each trailhead can be reserved, and those only by a lottery system--no more "fastest fingers win the prize." And the remaining 40% are available first-come-first-served to walk ups on the day before.

This is great news. It means more permits will be available to people who really do use them, as opposed to reserving out all the permits to on-line reservations months in advance. Here's what the Yosemite website says:

Wilderness Permit Reservations

You can get a wilderness permit or reservation during three different periods:
> Reservations by lottery are available 24 weeks in advance on Recreation.gov.
> Reservations not taken by lottery are available on a first-come, first-served basis on Recreation.gov from about 22 weeks in advance until seven days before intended start date.
> Permits are available in-person on a first-come, first-served basis at permit issuing stations starting at 11 am one day before intended start date.

Sixty percent of reservations are available by reservation. Forty percent of permits (plus any unused reservations) are available starting one day in advance.

The processing fee is $10 per application. If you receive a wilderness permit, an additional fee of $5 per person applies. These fees are non-refundable and non-transferable.

You can only apply once per weekly lottery. While there isn't an annual limit on the number of confirmed reservations you can have, you can only have six active (i.e., future) reservations at any given time.
Wilderness permits are required all year, but reservations are only available for trips May through October.
The Yosemite Conservancy Wilderness Office processes all permit reservation applications. Its hours are Monday through Friday, 9 am to 4 pm.

And here's a link to the page that gives even more detail: https://www.nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/wpres.htm

As OregonMouse will confirm if she sees this, here in Oregon two national forests instituted a brand new permit system in the Central Cascades in 2021. No walk-up permits at all. 60% of permits were made available months in advance via a one-day dump, to be snatched up by whoever was fastest online. As a result, it was reported that more than 50% of the permits issued were never used.

So far, no announcements have been made that any changes to this system are in the works.

This is a big pet peeve of mine. You can call me a conspiracy theorist, but I am quite certain that people are writing computer codes to snatch up permits. I don't think a fast finger will do it anymore.

We had 6 people with atomic clocks trying to nab a campground reservation for the eclipse a couple years back. There was a four day window of sites becoming available and we couldn't get anything. I am convinced we were competing against computers.... and losing badly

I had the same problem for the eclipse. Interestingly, I was able to grab cancellations much closer to the event! We did have to move once during the week we were there, but otherwise we had a great solar eclipse experience and a great family reunion as well.

I did read about the problems with the Oregon wilderness areas. I was really miffed about it even though by the time it took effect my "hiking" has become limited to around the block with a walker. Old age has finally caught up with me.

One of the big problems with reservation.gov is that people make reservations and then neither show up nor cancel, leaving the space unusable while half a dozen cars are circling the campground looking for a vacancy.

As it will to all of us if we are lucky. I find that more and more I appreciate my deep reservoir of good memories and my archive of old photos. Lucky for me I still have a chance to add to them.

And I find the posts on this and other sites some compensation for no longer being able to participate. Thank you all for posting here!