Tioga Pass Resort

We stayed in Cabin 4 for two nights — and rodents (wood rats?) scampered around the cabin all night. As if the live sightings of the critters weren’t enough, the abundant poops on either side of our bed, in the kitchen/​dining area and in the bathroom were also testimony to their presence. I am not opposed to «rustic» but at 200+ a night, this is not what we were paying for. We followed up with the management who did respond appropriately after-​the-​fact. We very much appreciate that. The location is pretty wonderful, but given our experience, we wish we had stayed in Yosemite or down the road in Lee Vining. I don’t think this experience is the norm for all the cabins/​rooms.

We had a wonderful time staying at TPR. We stayed in a cabin with our four young boys. (Ages 6 months — 6 years) They had an amazing time exploring around the cabin. We took a great hike (nature walk) around some lakes. Such a beautiful setting and relaxing atmosphere.
The cabin was VERY clean which ranks very high in my book. It wasn’t fancy with all the latest amenities, but it was very well maintained. The beds were also comfortable.
The best part of our stay was dinner at the café. We ate both dinner and breakfast here. While breakfast was good, it is worth the drive just for dinner! My husband and I each ordered an entrée, which we shared with our three young kids. It was enough food to feed all of us and it was absolutely delicious. I spoke with the chef and complimented the meal. He thanked me and told me he studied at the Cordon Bleu in NY. It shows!
Everything was perfectly cooked — roasted chicken, dressings and gravy were made from scratch. The soup was amazing as well.
The drive up the pass is worth it just to have some wonderful comfort food, and a perfect, peaceful setting.

The TPR was our saving grace this week for my family. We had no place to stay as Tioga Road was shut down due to a fire. We had a campsite but it got evacuated so the lovely people at TPS gave us a room for the night at an incredible discount as we had no where else to go. Everyone was so nice there, helped us with whatever we needed. Plus they had coffee and tea in the lobby, hot and ready to drink all day. I highly recommend to anyone who loves the Sierras to plan a trip to Tioga Pass Resort!

This rating (four stars) is a mixture of both the café and the room.
The room:
I stayed in Motel Room #1 July 28 & 29. I had stayed in a cabin about ten years ago and really enjoyed it. The motel rooms, as well as the cabins, have no WiFi, cell service or TV. As long as you know that going in, no problem. The room was small but clean and had what was advertised (toilet and sink, decent small beds). It also has a balcony, which is pleasant to read or lounge around on. The shower was fifteen feet outside of the room, and was decent.
The only real complaint about the room is the noise from the adjoining rooms. The walls are thin and you are at the mercy of your neighbors. You get to go to sleep when they go to sleep! I would stay in a cabin again, but not in one of their «motel rooms.»
The café:
The café is delicious, but has very limited seating. If you pay with a credit card, you will be asked to enter your e-​mail address on their electronic gizmo and they will e-​mail it to you! I didn’t initially get mine like I was supposed to, but ten days later, after requesting them again, they were e-​mailed to me (they told me their satellite had been down).
Hearty meals, great desserts and decent service, considering there is only one server.

I had a terrible experience at this restaurant. I arrived around 11am. They stop serving breakfast at 11:30am. Once the woman working saw us take our seats, ready to order, she walked into the kitchen and disappeared until 11:32am. She then wouldn’t allow us to order breakfast when she finally came to our table. She purposefully avoided us for 20 minutes, until after they stopped serving breakfast, so we couldn’t order it. I left the restaurant without ordering, very unhappy, as there aren’t many other options for food in the area. Oh, and it’s my birthday. Don’t eat here, guys, it’s not worth it.

We stayed for a couple of nights in June in cabin 6 and enjoyed our stay.
Pros:
Cabin was cute, cozy and had a nice sitting area overlooking the creek.
Wonderful location close to Tuolumne Meadows and hiking in Yosemite.
Seems reasonably priced given the remote location.
Food was tasty in the café.
We were concerned that you would hear car noise from the highway but you don’t.
Cons:
Lack of privacy, our front porch overlooked the employee hangout area and bathrooms.
Lack of consistency w/​staff, some said we could run a tab & charge meals to the room, another insisted we pay as we go. As a result we were overcharged and had to write (no phone) for a refund, never got any response to our web inquiry but did get our money refunded.
The service in the café was weird-​we joked that the fellow running the place was the «café nazi». He would bark at us when we entered the café «Don’t sit there» insisting that as a couple we could only sit at the counter since he was expecting big crowds. We never saw the crowds and turned around to leave since we didn’t want to sit at the counter to eat dinner, he reluctantly but ungraciously relented. Made dining in the café unpleasant.

This is a review for both the caffe and the hotel.
We stopped there on Memorial Day Weekend. We were supposed to camp in the wilderness but since it rained/​snowed and since I was freezing we decided to take our chances at TPR. We got the only room left (#2) that we paid $ 140. And this price for the quality of the room is the only star down. You can hear your neighbors sneezing, talking, caughing… which I would have been fine with if the shower was not outside of the room. Walking under the snow when you are soaking wet isn’t amaziiiiiing for that price.
Otherwise, I do not regret my stay over there and would recommend the place!
The food is quite basic but it’s good (and probably the best in the whole Yosemite park).
Shout out the extremely nice people working at TPR

Good stop but I dearly miss the bubbling cauldron of sausage gravy sitting behind the counter. They quit that when the new owners took over but I still like the place.

We stayed Labor Day weekend at Tioga Pass Resort. TPR has 10 detached cabins, and 4 attached motel rooms, and is located 2 miles from the eastern entrance of Yosemite Park, near the top of Tioga Pass. It is 10 miles from Tuolumne Meadows Lodge, the closest lodging to the Tuolumne Meadows hiking area.
Last year there was no internet reservation system with credit card deposit –everything was done by e-​mail, and on the honor system, as the e-​mail was not secure. The honor system is toast in today’s world. TPR lost its shirt with so many no shows!
In June 2014 the internet site, tiogapassresort, came with an interactive reservation system, allowing you to choose cabin/​motel room by date, with forfeiture of credit card deposits for those cancelling within 14 days of arrival, or noshows. Welcome to the 21^st century! Now it is the no shows, not TPR, that will lose their shirts!
One drawback: you cannot cancel a reservation on the internet site!
We walked 240′ to our cabin 9 on the top of the hill, instead of driving the Prius up and down the steep gravel roadway for five reasons:
1. Prevent scratches from brush next to the narrow winding gravel roadway.
2. Prevent damage to undercarriage from bottoming out at the bottom of the hill, after crossing the plank bridge, and going up the parking lot.
3. Prevent bottoming out at the top of the hill, filled with a layer of concrete, but rutted with torn areas down to the dirt, next to cabins 9 and 10.
4. No encounters with cars coming up the hill, who have the right of way, at the blind curve –ever try backing up a blind curve in the dark, with thick brush and boulders on each side? Your car’s lower and side spoilers will get scratched!
5. You are going to walk down the gravel pathway anyways for breakfast and dinner, just don’t try it in sandals –sandals and sloped gravel trails don’t mix –just like me and my ex!
Do not get cabins 1,2,3,4,5 next to the stream in June, as you will look like the second coming of chickenpox, with all the mosquitos that will be biting!
$ 125 for motel room comparable in price to Tuolumne Meadows Lodge tent cabins with wood burning furnaces –in both cases no noise insulation –You will be SOL if next door to a snorer, crying baby, loud farter, or an over amorous couple. At TML you would be SOL if any of the dozen tents in the vicinity had a snorer, crying baby, loud farter, or an over amorous couple!
Also you will freeze your ass off at TML due to the near impossiblity of keeping the wood burning furnace going all night –you would need a steady stream of mountain of logs all night. And it does get cold at night in September –our car had a layer of ice on the hatch in the morning!
$ 125 for a 13′ x 13′ motel room or 169 sq foot motel room, not including the telephone booth size shower 30′ from your motel room door –you would not want to have a wardrobe malfunction over that 30′ outdoor walk!
We had cabin 9, $ 250 for a 23′ x 18′ or 414 sq foot room, not including balcony. Two full size beds, with bathroom, shower, and two fully reclining padded chairs!
Fully equipped kitchen, with microwave, toaster, gas stove, refrigerator, dishware and pots and pans, albeit a bit scratched up, and looks like something from 1970 Good Housekeeping!
Balcony with afternoon sunshine, and picnic table in the back with morning sunshine! Serene surroundings of lakes and mountains, broken only by the roar of motorcycles echoing for miles through the pass!
No AC, but not needed at 9500 feet, with nights cold enough to leave car covered with ice. 100 year old unit, with water, not tasty with an annual supplement of iron overnight, from the 100 year old pipes!
Tough sleeping at this altitude –make sure to bring the Tylenol pm next trip!
No TV, no wifi, and no cell phone access, not needed if you go over the edge of the Tioga Pass in the dark on the way to Lee Vining –it’s hasta la vista, baby, to quote our ex Governor!

Super cute small restaurant with an old-​school mountain lodge style menu (not surprising since the restaurant is in an old-​school mountain lodge). Great execution in the kitchen on the vegetable soup and pot roast (served on a hearty camp-​style metal plate that made me feel like I should be cutting wood afterward). Great service and a fantastic location!

This restaurant/​café is very yummy. Stayed at campground Junction which is just right below TPJ and just walked to and from and had breakfast (Miner’s Skillet) highly recommend. Very tasty and big portioned. After breakfast enjoyed a piece of homemade Banana cream pie. (Yum)! Also, had lunch at TPR and shared it with my Bf. We had the North Peak melt which was homemade meatloaf sandwich on sourdough. It hit the spot along with homemade potato salad and a slice of dill pickle. Afterwards, we enjoyed Coconut cream pie and Chocolate cream pie. This place is a great stop. Come up every year. This year TPR celebrated their 100^th Anniversary. (Awesome) Now once you pay you may use credit/​debt and also include a tip; have the receipt emailed to you. :) Can’t wait to go visit next year. Always great workers that treat you like family. Great food, peaceful, and relaxing. The store that is apart of the café is cool to look at too. I absolutely love TPR. And one day would like to stay in their cabins.

This review is about the restaurant/​café, not the accommodation itself.
If you are going to the backside of Yosemite and you either 1) LOVE PIES (who the hell doesn’t, right? right?) 2) need sustenance before your backpacking trip 3) need sustenance after your backpacking trip 4) are looking for a great vegan/​vegetarian option 5) are not vegetarian but unfortunately your hungry, whiny girlfriend is (haha, that’s me!) YOU FOUND YOUR PLACE!
All I gotta say is: Fresh baked goods. They have a list of pies and other homemade baked goods on the board. Anywhere from your cream pies (coconut, banana, etc.) to crumbs and pies (peach, blueberry, apple, mixed berries, etc.) We were so stuffed after our burgers (BF got a regular one, which he inhaled in 5 minutes if that; I got the vegan one with avocados on top – oh, oh, their potato salad was eggy and delicious, too!), but we still got an apple crumb. Yum! This is right before we backpacked the Saddleback Lake loop. I love backpacking because Backpacking=Eat Whatever You Want.
As the other reviewers state, the place is super cute. Wooden counters with a nice communal feel, cute decors, cute cute cute! We hit the place around 2:30, right after the lunch rush and were able to get seated right away. I also think that the warm people are what makes this place so special. They talked to me about their yurts (that’s where the employees live), and they told me about their pies (I love pies!), and they also seemed to have a great rapport with one another. Such love and such yummy food. It truly is a gem.

A true jewel of the Eastern Sierra, good restaurant too.

This is a very small and rustic lodge located near the top of Tioga Pass on Highway 120 just outside the eastern entrance into Yosemite.
The breakfast is above average, their homemade carrot cake tastes as good as it looks and their cookies are also a must try. Discovered this spot last year and was lucky enough to come back this year. The staff says they close down for fall/​winter during the end of September.

As I grew up in a mecca for ethnic food (LA/​San Gabriel Valley), I’m not usually too impressed by mainstream American fare. But Tioga Pass Resort (or TPR as the locals would call it) passes the litmus test.
TPR is a small café, so expect a wait during peak meal times. We came around 7 pm on a Monday, but the wait was tolerable, perhaps around 15 – 30 minutes. Why was it tolerable? In an adjacent room is a cozy sitting area, with lounge chairs, couches, and even a table. My friend fell asleep in the lounge chair! Also, if you’re so inclined, you can order beer, coffee, other drinks, etc as you wait.
Service was great, but not perfect. The proprietor was the modicum of calm, while her sole waitress/​server was a bit stressed even on a weekday. (Because it’s such a small café – I would say only a dozen people can be seated at once – they skimp by using as less staff as possible.) So though she was courteous, she was bit brusk because she had all these other tables to wait on. Small inconvenience for us, but not horrible.
I ordered the «Char-​grilled 14 pound Louisiana style (spicy) sausage topped w/​sautéed onions and red bell peppers. Served on a toasted French roll» for $ 8.50, and a cup of chili, «Thick and Hearty beef and bean chili topped with cheddar cheese and diced onion» for $ 6.95. Utterly satisfied with my meal. I love spice, and that dog was spicy indeed – though I thought the French bread was too much bulk for my stomach. I recommend changing it to toast for the bun. As for the soup, one of the best damn chilis I’ve had. I loved how not one ingredient overwhelmed the chili. All parts were equalliy delicious.
For dessert we had peach-​boysenberry pie and boysenberry crumble. The pies are what TPR is most locally famous for. NEVER LEAVE WITHOUT ORDERING THEM. I’m partial to the boysenberry (what other berries are there?!), and ate it for breakfast the next day. Mmm, even reheated in the microwave it was great.
Anyway, if you’re in the Tuolumne Meadows area, and have an extra 30 – 45 minutes (especially from the May Lake area) to drive, I highly recommend making the drive to Lee Vining. Don’t subject yourself to the Yosemite National Park food. Eat quality American food in TPR!

The restaurant at Tioga Pass Resort is a hidden nugget among the towering granite walls just outside of Yosemite National Park. It’s the perfect spot to have a scrumptious, hearty meal after a fun day of outdoor activities. The service and food get an «A» from me and my husband, based on two dinners there. Because of the lack of atmosphere, I didn’t have high hopes for the food and service to be as good as it was, and way underestimated it. Given that options to dine in the area are limited, it’s more than satisfying that the establishment is so good. Unfortunately, we didn’t’ have room for dessert, but the desserts were all homemade and looked like grandma baked them. This place is definitely a spot for a good meal.

Tioga Pass Resort is really great. We spent the weekend in Yosemite and this was the perfect spot to stay. We stayed in Cabin 6, which I definitely recommend. It’s small but very quaint. There is a queen sized bed, small kitchen with a fridge and microwave, and a small bathroom. One recommendation is to fix the shower — the shower head is way too low for an average person. The best part is the small creek that runs outside — we sat on the porch and drank chilled wine after a long day of hiking and it was perfect. I also recommend the Tioga Pass Café — the food we had was fantastic!

My review is for the café only!
Very good food, reasonable priced. The setting is very cute, one center counter with about 12 seats around, and 3 table. Very small dinning hall.
The two things that prevented me from giving this place a 5-​stars:
1. Breakfast stopped serving promptly at 11am, even I was there by 11:10am; but lunch serves till it closes…
2: Coffee was weak!
Server is a older lady, but attentive and quick, running the place smoothly on her own.
Homemade deserts are great.
Remember, this café is cash only.

I have been meaning to review Tioga Pass Resort for more than a year now. Initially, I wanted to review it along with Tioga Lake, but I don’t like to intentionally bunch five-​star reviews because it kind of cheapens them. I was going to write this review last month, but then I decided that a third of a lifetime’s worth of memories would be no substitute for a recent trip – my first here in nine years – so in the interest of fairness, both to other Unilocalers and to Tioga Pass Resort itself, I held off until I had visited again.
What a change, and not for the better.
Almost everything about this place is the same. It’s still a welcome sight after braving the scariest part of Tioga Pass, and it’s situated at a nice point for lunch or even for a bathroom break. So why did I knock a sure five-​star rating all the way down to a tenuous three stars?
The answer, my friends, is wet flies.
I would have loved to end this review on that cryptic note, but both because I want this review to survive Unilocal’s touchy censors and because I like to hear myself talk – er, read myself write? – I’m going to explain.
One of the joys of my family’s at-​one-​time-​annual-​but-​now-​whenever-​we-​can-​all-​get-​together trips to Mammoth is our day at Tioga Lake, and fishing is a vital part of this day. Yes, it’s still fun even if we don’t catch anything (the only time this has ever happened was last month), and the setting is downright perfect, but the fishing is still important. And my dad is an impatient fisherman, and he’s had some amazing success by using wet flies, which are like normal flies except that they sink rather than float (hence, «wet»), so they’re much easier to fish with. And the only place we’ve ever been able to find the type of wet flies that work at Tioga Lake – and it’s not a myth; fish in certain places actually do prefer certain types of flies – is at Tioga Pass Resort.
So imagine our dismay when we walked into the lovely little tackle-​shop part of Tioga Pass Resort last month only to find that all the fishing tackle was gone! The space is exactly the same, and they’ve added more postcards and touristy stuff, but it’s almost empty. When we asked the guy working at the counter what happened to the fishing tackle, he said, rather gruffly, «We don’t sell that anymore.» And he then explained that the nearest place to buy tackle was at Saddlebag Lake Resort, which was two miles away – it’s actually farther – and required traversing an unpaved road.
I understand if a place doesn’t want to go through the trouble of keeping up with the latest fishing trends and losing money on unsold inventory, but seriously? Fishing tackle? You don’t need to stock anything perishable. Some fishing leader, hooks, swivels, lures, bubbles, and flies won’t kill you. None of this stuff ever goes bad, so you could easily get rid of it. And you have a captive audience. Most people fishing at Tioga or Ellery Lake will buy whatever you’ve got.
I’m sorry, Tioga Pass Resort, but you probably really deserve two stars. I’m sticking with three because the setting is still amazing and because of all the fond memories I have of this place.

TPR is the perfect place to stop on the way back from a long day of climbing in Tuolumne Meadows or up one of the nearby peaks. They have great burgers and helpful staff. The place feels more like a small town café than a tourist trap.
UPDATE
Bumping up a star after meeting friendly employee Bill on a climb (La Cierta Edad) in Red Rocks. Bill gave me some great High Sierra route recommendations. Also, note that they will be closed in winter for the next few seasons: