> There are a ton of permits today for Friday

Well, there weren't any when I wrote the message above, and there are none now, too. Point is, you need to be checking often.

Those day hike slots for Friday (tomorrow)... need to be picked up before close of business (4:30) Thursday. So whatever was available would be worthless if they become available after that... unless you just want to wander up to Trail Camp and back, since you'd need to pick up the permit at 8AM, and really couldn't start hiking until maybe 9.

Permits start showing online up 2 days before, because that's the earliest people can claim their reservations, and so some slots get dropped. Thing is, the dropped slots go back online at random time after that -- to prevent scalpers from dropping slots and selling them to people like you. grin