Half Dome, Yosemite Hike 2006

Every day hikers make the full-day hike up to the top of Half Dome in Yosemite, California.  In fact, I did this in 2005 with several friends. Today, we highlight a video of Sam Thornley, 19, and three friends, who hiked Half Dome in 2006.  Half Dome is a “granite dome” in the Yosemite Valley that rises 4,737 feet from the valley floor. Approximately a 17 mile hike, up and back, it’s one of the best day hikes (if you are in shape) in the world.  If you are too out of shape, or can’t get to Yosemite, you can enjoy the hike through this video.

Yosemite National Park is located in the central Sierra Nevada of California and lies 150 miles east of San Francisco and only a six hour drive from Los Angeles. Designated a World Heritage Site in 1984, Yosemite is internationally recognized for its spectacular granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, giant sequoia groves, and biological diversity. The 750,000-acre, 1,200 square-mile park contains thousands of lakes and ponds, 1600 miles of streams, 800 miles of hiking trails, and 350 miles of roads. Two federally designated wild and scenic rivers, the Merced and Tuolumne, begin within Yosemite’s borders and flow west into California’s Central Valley. Annual park visitation exceeds 3.5 million, with most visitor use concentrated in the seven square mile area of Yosemite Valley.

You’ll find information about Yosemite and Half Dome at the National Park Service website.

Read more on Half Dome in this Wikipedia entry.

Also, here’s a nice Half Dome photo journal of someone else’s hike.

Thanks to Sam Thornley for posting (and I assume filming) this at YouTube.com. Visit the Sam Thornley Youtube profile.

Technorati: travel | video | voyeur | youtube | Half Dome | Yosemite | Hiking