Hi, We will be travelling from San Francisco to Salt Lake City in an RV next summer and it will be our first RV (even camping for that matter) experience. I am planning our trip and am at the stage of our three days stay at Yosemite NP. I read that it will be almost impossible to get a spot in the Yosemite village campgrounds and that we will probably end up in a campground outside of the park (e.g. the Ridge resort). I was wondering what the usual practices are when wee want to go hiking in the park. Do we take the RV from the outside campground all the way to Yosemite, park there and go for the hike? Newbie question , I know. Thanks, Marc
We visited Yosemite last summer and the parking was horrendous. We stayed at an RV park in Groveland and drove the truck to the national park for visits. It was hard enough finding a parking place for the pickup; I can't even imagine parking an RV.
Being a first timer to RVing, picking Yosemite to visit during the summer months in an RV isn't exactly the best spot to pick. As Luvtheroad mentioned above, parking for "any" vehicle is almost impossible, plus any RV park within reasonable driving distance from Yosemite itself is most likely already booked solid for the summer ahead. Rving is a wonderful experience but it can also be disappointing if you find yourself dropping the anchor in a Walmart parking lot overnight due to not having a real park to stay in. Have you checked the local area parks to see if you will be able to get a space to stay in? Plus if you aren't towing a get around vehicle that makes visiting Yosemite even more difficult in your RV alone. When you first start into RVing you need to do a lot of homework and research to insure that you won't be "camping out" in that Walmart lot. There are lots of folks on this forum who will be more than happy to jump in and give you some pointers on how to make your first trip a real memorable one instead of being a nightmare one. Good luck, just keep asking questions and listening to the answers and then heeding the advice of others that are old timers at it. Safe and Happy travels to you....................... Regards. Bankshot
Another thing. We couldn't have taken our fiver from Groveland to Yosemite even if we wanted to. There was a tunnel we were too tall for (we're 13'1"). We might have been able to get down the middle, but they don't stop traffic to let you do that. Don't know what kind of RV you have, but check your height to make sure you can get through the tunnel. Are you taking 120 over to Yosemite? You have to go over Moccasin Grade before you get to Groveland and then on to Ridge Resort and that road is NOT for the faint of heart.
Several years ago we spent the spring at Yosemite lakes 5 miles from the west entrance to Yosemite and they had a public campground ( it is a private club owned ) and that would be a good place to start from. It is expensive if I remember right, As Yoasemite valley is small they stop cars going in once the park gets full and then let cars in as people leave.
You didn't mention what type of RV you will be driving. Will you have a motor home, trailer, 5th wheel? Will you have a tow vehicle? This makes a difference as far as how mauverable you will be.
