Long day hike from the Sunrise Trialhead to the tops of Clouds Rest and Half Dome
A more recent, later in the season hike of just Clouds Rest is here

I've climbed Half Dome once a year for the past 7-8 years and decided to tack this years trip onto my weekend plans. This is the third year I've done the trip from Sunrise rather than Happy Isles, as I find this route to be much more senic and less crowded than the trial from the Valley floor. It's a bit of workout- 26 or so miles with 7500ft of elevation gain, but the effort is more than worth it.

I usually do this hike in the fall, and thus I was dismayed to discover that in late June "Tenaya" is apparantly the Native American word for "lake with millions of mosquitos". The lower portions of the trail were blanketed with the bugs, who laughed at my DEET coating and made the early and late hours of the trip a miserable experience.

After having spent the night at the Tuolumne Meadows campground, I packed and made the short drive to the trailhead around 5:30. We're only a week off of the solstice and I used all 16 or so hours of daylight to complete the trip, getting to watch both the sunrise and sunset from the first ridge near the trailhead. Got back to the parking lot around 9pm and began the 4 hour drive back to Mountain View.