Camping Before Your Yosemite Backpacking Trip

There are several options for camping before a Yosemite backpacking trip:

• Reservable “car camping” sites
• First come, first served “car camping” sites
• Yosemite Backpackers Campgrounds (unavailable in 2025)
• Nearby hotels

Car camping options:

Car camping sites are what most people think of when they think of camping. You have a site, you pull your car up to the site, unload your tent and gear, and you’re camping, close to your car.  Some of these sites are reservable, some are first come, first served. 
All reservable sites are reserved on the Recreation.gov website.
It’s important to consider where your trip starts before choosing a campsite. It’s about a 2 hour drive from Tuolumne Meadows to Wawona or the Ostrander Lake Trailhead, for example.

Tuolumne Meadows– ON HWY 120
Porcupine Flat  -On HWY 120
White Wolf  (not opening in 2025) -On HWY 120
Tamarack Flat  On HWY 120
Crane Flat  – near Big Oak Flat and the turn to HWY 120
Hodgdon Meadow – near the Big Oak Flat entrance
Wawona– near the Southern/Wawona entrance to the park
Bridalveil Creek– on Glacier Point Rd

Yosemite Valley Campsites:
Camp 4 
Upper Pines 
Lower Pines 
North Pines

Outside Yosemite, near the Big Oak Flat entrance on HWY 120:
Dimond O Campground

Outside Yosemite, on HWY 120- may be closer than many campgrounds inside the park. These are all in the Inyo National Forest and are first come, first served, with no reservations:
Tioga Lake Campground
Junction Campground
Ellery Lake Campground
Big Bend Campground 
Aspen Campground

All campgrounds in the Inyo National Forest are listed here: Inyo National Forest Service campgrounds- these are all outside of Yosemite and may be a significant distance from your trip.

Backpackers Campgrounds

Note for 2025: The Yosemite Valley and White Wolf Backpackers Campgrounds are closed, most likely for the entire season. Tuolumne Meadows Backpackers Camp may open in August, but we are not sure.
It may be possible to camp in Camp 4 in Yosemite Valley, where there are very few backpackers spots available.

Yosemite National Park provides several backpackers campgrounds throughout the park for the exclusive use of backpackers on the night before their trip. No reservations are required or available. There is an $8/person fee. You must have the backpacking permit information and the recreation.gov mobile app downloaded to your phone in advance to use the Scan & Pay feature to pay onsite. 
There are four backpackers campgrounds in the park:
Yosemite Valley CLOSED in 2025. 
Tuolumne Meadows Might open in August 2025
White Wolf CLOSED IN 2025
Hetch Hetchy -OPEN year round, but only accessible in or out during daylight hours.

The backpacker’s campground is not a “car camping” campground. When you arrive, you have to park in a temporary parking spot, hike your overnight gear in a short  walk to the camp, then return to your car and move it to overnight parking, then hike to get back to the camp. You can not leave your car overnight in the temporary spots, 
In the morning you have to pack up your things, and hike back to your car.

Important details for the backpackers campgrounds:  

You need to know our wilderness permit number or permit reservation number to camp here.
You are not camping close to your car for the night: You need to park, hike your gear in, then repark farther away, then hike back to the camp.
You need to pay $8/person to camp here. You can only pay via the recreation.gov app. Cash is not accepted.

Nearby hotels: