Mono Lake Region
Twin Lakes Rd dead-ends at Annett’s Mono Village, a huge and rather chaotic tumbledown resort on Upper Twin Lake. It has cheap, cramped lodging, and a kitschy low-ceilinged cafe studded with taxidermied fish. The surroundings are beautiful and the location fairly remote, but it feels far from the wilderness with its fully stocked grocery store, gift shop and ATM. Pay showers available.
The road here closes in winter.
21.92 MILES
North America’s second-oldest lake is 70 sq miles, and a quiet and mysterious expanse of deep blue water. The glassy surface reflects jagged Sierra peaks,…
20.44 MILES
At Bodie State Historic Park, a gold-rush ghost town is preserved in a state of 'arrested decay.' Weathered buildings sit frozen in time on a dusty,…
28.86 MILES
Yosemite's most distinctive natural monument, Half Dome is 87 million years old and has a 93% vertical grade – the sheerest cliff in North America…
23.87 MILES
This ‘honey, hit the brakes!’ viewpoint, midway between the May Lake turnoff and Tenaya Lake, is a lunar landscape of glaciated granite with a stunning…
29.65 MILES
West of Yosemite Village, Yosemite Falls is considered the tallest waterfall in North America, dropping 2425ft (740m) in three tiers. A slick trail leads…
18.76 MILES
Stretching nearly 3 miles from Pothole Dome in the west to Lembert Dome in the east, Tuolumne’s main meadow is beautiful to behold, especially at sunset,…
22.16 MILES
Just east of Olmsted Point, the shiny blue surface of Tenaya Lake (8150ft) looks absolutely stunning framed by thick stands of pine and a series of smooth…
24.13 MILES
Peculiar-shaped tufa spires ring the shimmering Mono Lake, but the biggest grove is on the southern rim, with a mile-long interpretive trail. The bizarre…
2.19 MILES
Constituting 128,000 acres of backcountry paradise, Hoover includes the Virginia Lakes, Lundy Lake and high peaks to the west bordering Yosemite National…
7.05 MILES
A stroll down a hillside brings you to this out-of-the-way (though it can still get crowded) hot spring. Water emerges piping hot and cools as it trickles…
3. Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest
9.14 MILES
At 6.3 million acres, this is the largest national forest in the lower 48 states. Most of it is in Nevada, with a small portion around Bridgeport in…
11.13 MILES
In an 1880 schoolhouse, this museum has mining artifacts on display from all the local ghost towns, plus a room of fine Paiute baskets. Only open during…
11.17 MILES
The gavel has been dropped since 1880 at this courthouse, an all-white Italianate dreamboat surrounded by a gracious lawn and a wrought-iron fence. On the…
16.56 MILES
On the north shore of Mono Lake are the Black Point Fissures, narrow crags that opened when a lava mass cooled and contracted about 13,000 years ago…
18.39 MILES
Pothole Dome marks the western end of Tuolumne Meadows. It’s small by Yosemite standards, but the short, 200ft climb to the top offers great views of the…
18.47 MILES
Above the north shore of the Tuolumne River, carbonated mineral water burbles silently out of Soda Springs, a small natural spring that turns its…