Author Topic: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?  (Read 1024 times)

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Offline CrimsonSunrise

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Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« on: June 28, 2014, 09:48:59 PM »
We're taking the grand kids to Yosemite and Sequoia National Park for a few days in a couple weeks.  I haven't been since the early 70's, and I was like 8 at the time and don't know logistics of the parks.  So, has anyone planned a trip to either?  I'm reading and researching as much as I can so I can give them the best time possible.  Because it's a short notice trip, all the good lodgings are booked.  I've booked places for both locations.  Hopefully they'll be good.  For Sequoia, the hotel is a 20-30 min drive from the park entrance.  It's gonna be a whirlwind tour, 2 days in Yosemite park, and maybe a day and a half in Sequoia.  Please help me build an itinerary! 


 Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!  Thanks!
« Last Edit: June 28, 2014, 09:54:13 PM by CrimsonSunrise »

Offline yeshaberto

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Re: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« Reply #1 on: June 29, 2014, 01:10:45 AM »
I was in yosemite about a month ago, and the falls were still strong.  The last five times I've been to yosemite have just been one day trips.  by the time you drive up the mountain roads from the nearest affordable hotel, sit in traffic in the park, deal with the excessive congestion in the park for summertime, do a few hikes and ride the bus around the whole park to see everything you want to...you are ready to move on!
Not that this one day is not beyond amazing, but it makes for a long day.
Has been two years since Sequoia, but glad you were able to find lodging that close.
Really excited for you and the grandkids.

Offline CrimsonSunrise

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Re: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« Reply #2 on: June 29, 2014, 02:47:33 AM »
So, getting around Yosemite, is it better to just drive ourselves? Or tour bus? We'll have 2 days there, so I guess we can split the itinerary in two?  As far as Seqouia, I'm actually bummed we have to stay so far away.  All the way to Visalia almost, but the only hotels left in three rivers had some really crappy reviews.  I figure we can drive an extra 20 mins each way, and save $150 a night on hotel.  Besides El Capitain and half dome, what would you say the highlights of Yosemite are?  Best waterfall? ( Loree LOVES waterfalls). 

Online lordxizor

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Re: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« Reply #3 on: July 01, 2014, 07:04:13 PM »
We were in Yosemite last summer. We spent basically all of our time in the main valley. There's tons to do there. I would highly recommend hiking up Sentinel Dome. It's like a mile and a half, relatively easy hike and you end up on top of a rocky dome that's nearly as high in elevation as Half Dome. Awesome views with like 1/50th the effort. It's on the road to Glacier Point, which is another must. There's a nice, short hike in the valley to Mirror Lake that is nice as well.

The site below gives you a good plan for a day trip. If you're going to Sequoia NP, you can probably skip the Mariposa grove as it's more sequoias, which you'll see later. I would suggest getting into the park very early to beat some of the crowds and find a parking spot. We stayed in a private cabin within the park and got into the valley at like 7:30 and it wasn't very busy, though nothing was open yet and the shuttle weren't running yet. Take the shuttle buses through the valley. It's way easier.

https://www.yosemitehikes.com/yosemite-tour/whirlwind-highlights.htm

Offline bosk1

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Re: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« Reply #4 on: October 09, 2018, 01:53:56 PM »
Wow, I didn't realize this thread was this old.  And, more to the point, I didn't realize prior to last week just how long it has been since I have been to Yosemite.  We did kind of a single-day drive-through with the boys when they were small.  They are now 15 and 13.  Where does the time go?

Anyhow, my wife spur of the moment decided she wanted to go this past weekend.  Unfortunately, we had some other commitments, so we couldn't even do the entire long weekend there.  We only had one full day in the park, but it was nice.  The major thing we did while there was a hike up just past the top of Vernal Falls, which is part of the hike to Half Dome.  A couple of observations:
-Our hike was only about 4.5 miles round trip.  I was wondering why the ranger gave about 3-4 hours for that hike because that is pretty SLOW.  But there is a LOT of climbing for such a short distance.  I get it now.
-Really nice views.  I want to do this hike again and perhaps go to the sub-dome (you need a permit to actually hike the sub-dome and Half Dome).  That is almost a full-day hike (the hike all the way up Half Dome is a full day plus, for those who don't know; if you start right at sunrise, you typically get back just at or after dark), and would provide some really nice views.  Not sure I want to do the dome itself.  But we'll see.
-Columbus Day weekend is a GREAT time to go.  A lot of the falls weren't nearly as powerful as earlier in the year, but the ones on the trail we went to were still nice.  And the crowds were pretty thin, which was the best part of it.

Thinking about maybe doing a more extensive trip next year.  With the kids growing up, it's amazing how many more things we want to do that we are running out of time for.
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Offline cramx3

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Re: Anyone been to Yosemite or Sequoia's recently?
« Reply #5 on: October 09, 2018, 03:53:20 PM »
I'd love to check out those parks.  My gf and I have made a point to hit up many National Parks together.  In 2017 we did 5 along the west coast but didn't go far enough south to hit Yosemite, we figured we would save that for another trip sometime.  This year we did the Everglades.  We just recently started discussing 2019 and thinking of getting the yearly pass and trying to do road trips to Acadia (my gf has been there, but I have not) and to the Smokey Mountains while doing a real vacation to Vegas hitting up the Grand Canyon and Zion while out there.  Yosemite will happen eventually.