I am happy to share with you the highlights and downsides of our trip and the planning mistakes we made.
We sat down and planned our trip ahead of time but failed to find some information that would have made the trip even better.
My family spent a wonderful day in Sequoia National Park together with my brother’s family. (Above my seven-year-old by a smaller sequoia) Between us, we have five kids, and three children have been diagnosed with ADHD, ages fifteen, twelve, eight, seven, and five.
Sequa National Park is a great place to take kids. My children were awed by the massive trees! Who doesn’t love a Giant Sequoia?
There are paved walkways in some areas. For example, the famous General Sherman tree has a paved walkway from the trolly stop to the tree, so it’s accessible for both strollers and wheelchairs.
There are some short hikes through the woods that even five-year-olds can manage in the heat without problems. Just make sure you pack plenty of water!
In this post, we will be covering the following…
- Where to stay
- What are the roads like
- Where to park
- What time to get there
- What park entrance to use
- What the shuttles are like
- Where to eat
- What to pack for a day trip
- Itinerary option 1, for one day at sequoia park with kids
- Itinerary option 2, for one day at sequoia park with kids
- Good to know
Where to stay while visiting Sequoia National Park
We chose to stay in Fresno, California because we planned to drive to Sequoia National Park, Kings Canyon, and Yosemite and use the rental house in Fresno as a base.
Renting a house was the best option because we were three families.
A rental is often the best choice for families who struggle with ADHD.
A hotel room, even a suite, is often cramped for our family of five, and my kids are constantly irritated with each other because no one has any space.
Fresno works as a base to see Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon. It is a bit of a drive, one hour and 20 min to get to the park entrance plus a drive to parking, and you must get up early to get a parking space in the better spots.
Fresno does have a larger selection of rental houses to choose from, but if you have kids who don’t do well in the car look for a rental property close to the park entrance or stay in the park at one of the lodges. We haven’t personally stayed in the park’s lodging, but the families we talked to during our visit were happy with their accommodations.
What to expect on the roads between Fresno and Sequoia National Park
Staying in Fresno worked well for visiting Sequoia National Park, and Kings Canyon. Google Maps says it’s 1 hour and 20 minutes to the park entrance, but you still need to drive a ways past the entrance to find parking. Once you’re in the park, then it’s a winding road. We had to drive slowly.
Several in our group got car sick, especially our twelve-year-old; she held a puke bag for the last 30 min. of the drive.
If you have motion-sick family members, Dramamine is a must, but don’t do what we did and give your kid the drowsy kind! She was dragging her feet till we bought her a huge soda pop at lunch!
Make sure you have non-drowsy Dramamine for the morning drive; otherwise, you’ll be tired when it’s time to see the sights.
We traveled the grey route HWY 180 (see the map above this section). Both the blue route and the grey route are marked to the park entrances, but the red pin is approximately the middle of the most touristed areas of the park. As you can see you’ll need to keep driving a bit to park and ride the shuttle.
Because the roads are winding sometimes with steep drop-offs on one side, it took us longer than expected to arrive at the park. The nature of the roads between Kings Canyon and Sequoia National park thwarted our plan to see both parks in one day.
Because we tried to see Kings Canyon in the evening after we finished at Sequoia Park, we only got one glance at the Canyon. We thought we could cover more ground in one day than was actually possible.
A park ranger advised us not to go further into Kings Canyon because we would’ve had trouble driving there at dusk/night.
Each park deserves at least a whole day dedicated to it.
Where to park at Sequoia National Park with a big car and family in toe
We drove in on HWY 180 and parked at Wuksachi Lodge. This was a nice place to park, and the parking lot wasn’t the first to fill up on a busy day.
We visited Sequoia National Park on the fourth of July weekend. It was packed!
Shuttles began service on May 26 this year and will end service on September 11th. After that, it’s not peak season, and you can drive between sights and still find a parking spot.
When riding the shuttle, the park suggests you use the larger parking areas at Wolverton and Lodgepole Campground.
If you arrive on a weekend or holiday as we did, I recommend the Wuksachi Lodge parking lot. You won’t need to fight others for parking spaces, and finding a spot on the shuttle from Wuksachi Lodge was no problem.
Parking at Lodgepole Campground may save you a little time if you plan to take the green line directly to the Giant Forrest Museum.
It can be good to know that the parking area at the Giant Forest Museum is usually full by mid-morning on weekends and holidays.
This parking lot at Wusachi Lodge was practical and had a restaurant. We didn’t want to carry food all day and returned to the restaurant for lunch. Another good alternative is packing sandwiches for everyone and eating supper at the restaurant before driving home.
At Wuksachi Lodge, we borrowed the bathrooms and took the shuttle from Wuksachi to the Accessible Sherman Tree Trail.
What Time Should you get to Sequoia National Park?
The in-park shuttles run from 8:00 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. Most websites suggest you get to Sequoia at 7:00. You would beat the crowd if you arrived at 7:00, but we didn’t want to wake the kids exceptionally early.
We aimed to be at the parking lot by 8:00.
We stayed in Fresno, about a one-hour and thirty-minute drive to a parking lot. We packed breakfast to eat in the car the night before and woke everyone up at 6:00.
We were on our way by 6:30 but stopped for a bathroom break near the park entrance and needed to stop again because one of the kids was car sick.
We rented a 15-passenger van, so it needed to be driven slowly and responsibly on the winding roads (the back ends tend to swerve on such big vans).
Considering all that, we got to the Wuksachi Lodge parking lot around 8:30, even though we were aiming to be there at 8:00.
Unless you plan to hike directly from one of the parking lots, there isn’t any reason to arrive before the shuttles are open for the day.
The tourist centers may not open until 9:00. The Lodge was already open when we arrived at 8:30. We used the restrooms in the Lodge and bought some snacks in the gift shop before hopping on the shuttle.
Which park entrance should you use when driving from Fresno to Sequoia National Park?
We drove to Sequoia National Park from HWY 180. That made the Wuksachi Lodge Parking lot the closest place to park. I haven’t tried entering the park from other entrances.
We drove the grey route in the picture below.
This was a nice park entrance, and we stopped to use bathrooms close to the entrance. There was a short line for the bathroom stalls early in the morning on the fourth of July weekend.
We did have to stop once or twice to let motion-sick kids out of the car after entering the park. The roads wind and twist, but I understand that all roads into the park are challenging if you suffer from motion sickness.
This is what the shuttles at Sequoia National Park were like.
The in-park shuttles run from 8:00 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. and are entirely ticketless, so hop on and off at any stop.
Print a Map of the shuttle system ahead of time.
Once in the park, the information on Sequoia’s website was often inaccessible because of sketchy Wi-Fi access. Download a park map ahead of time that doesn’t require wifi, or use a paper map. They give out paper maps for free on most shuttles.
The shuttles are nice and clean, and the drivers were helpful and informative. The shuttles ran about every 15 minutes.
On the fourth of July weekend, there were long lines for shuttles, but there was never a long line from Wuksachi Lodge. We shuttled from there in the morning, then shuttled back to eat lunch. We never had to wait more than a few minutes to leave the lodge and always got to sit on the shuttle.
The rest of the stops were hit-and-miss as far as sitting on the shuttles. Remember, this was a very popular weekend, and most people got an extra day off. The drivers packed people into each shuttle to shorten the waiting times.
Standing wasn’t the most comfortable way to shuttle around. It was pretty cramped, but It should be better on regular weekends.
Don’t count on being able to sit on the shuttles.
At the Sherman tree, there was a bit of a wait to get on the green line to shuttle to the Giant Forrest museum, but we didn’t wait more than 15-20 min.
At the Giant Forrest Museum, there was a long shuttle line to Moro Rock, so we walked the 3.5-kilometer trail to the rock. Even the 7-year-old and the 5-year-old in our group easily managed this hike with a stop or two to drink or eat a snack.
The shuttle from Moro rock back to the Giant Forrest Museum also had a decent line. We didn’t make it on the first shuttle after ascending the rock, and the next shuttle only had room for half of our group, so we split up.
Fortunately, the rest of our group arrived at the Museum only a few minutes later.
After the shuttle lines we’d seen during the day, the line back to the Sherman tree (you change shuttles there) was a bit of a shock! Extremely long lines and a 30-45 min wait at approximately 3:30 in the afternoon.
We took turns standing in line, going to the bathroom, filling water bottles, taking the kids to the museum, and looking at pine cones. The wait seemed to go by quicker than I expected.
Changing shuttles at The Sherman Tree didn’t take that long, but it would have been nice if some shuttles had longer routes and if, on the way home, people could choose a shuttle that took them all the way to the parking lots without transferring.
Tip; Let one person in your party stand in line for the shuttle as soon as you’re almost ready to leave any pick-up point (excluding Wuksachi Lodge). Let the rest of the group use the bathrooms to finish snacks etc. If your group isn’t back from the toilets when the shuttle is loading, just let others ahead of you in line.
Where to Eat at Sequoia National Park
We ate at the restaurant in Wuksachi Lodge and were pleasantly surprised. The Pizza was excellent, and they even had a gluten-free pizza for my mom, who must eat a special diet.
We were a party of eleven with five kids, three of which have ADHD and are incredibly picky eaters; the pizza and breadsticks made everyone happy! The restaurant seriously had something for everyone, and our whole group was pleased with the food and the generous portion sizes.
The restaurant sold salads, soft drinks, iced tea, and other types of food, but there were eleven of us, and it was easiest to buy the biggest pizzas and get food for everyone without sending all the kids through the food line.
The Wuksachi Restaurant sent you through a line similar to a cafeteria. It was on a first-come, first-serve basis.
The staff at the Lodge reception suggested we arrive at 11:00 when the restaurant opens, to get to the front of the line that usually forms at peak lunch hours.
We shuttled to the General Sherman Tree directly after arriving at Wuksachi Lodge, walked to the tree and back to the shuttle taking many stops and pictures, and shuttled back to Wusachi Restaurant for lunch. This setup worked exceptionally well.
We did take a cooler with lots of food and ice that we left in the car all day. The idea was to eat something for supper before leaving or eat in the car if we took longer than expected sightseeing. We wanted to go before dark.
It’s possible to take food with you on the shuttle, have a picnic lunch, and eat supper at the restaurant. We were a party of eleven, and packing food for two picnic meals with picky kids wasn’t feelable.
Eating out once a day is a nice compromise.
What to pack for a day trip to Sequoia National park
- Take plenty of water! There are filling stations, but hiking from The Giant Forrest Museum to Moro Rock almost depleted our water supply. If it’s hot, you can’t have too much water.
- One-day pack or backpack for each traveler. Put a small backpack on each child with their water bottle and a selection of snacks. Their bag won’t weigh much and letting everyone carry little shrinks the bags the parents must carry.
- Lots of snacks.
- Lunch if you plan to picnic.
- First aid kit.
- Sun hats.
- Hiking boots or leather sneakers (it’s best not to wear mesh shoes or sandals if you plan to hike).
- Extra socks can be extremely dusty if you walk a trail where they recently burned the forest.
- Sunglasses.
- Sunscreen.
- Picnic blanket
- Sunblock shirts
- Dramamine if you have motion-sick family members.
- Gatorade powder in case someone gets dehydrated.
- Candy if you need something to lock young children along the trails.
- Paper map of the area and a paper map of the trolly system.
Itinerary for 1 day in Sequoia National Park with Kids. (Our kids were between the ages of five and fifteen)
We had a great day in Sequoia National Park with our kids and extended family. We did try to cram too much in one day and had to cut some things from our itinerary.
One thing to keep in mind; Sequoia and Kings Canyon both need their own day. Don’t try to try to explore both parks in one day! We tried but gave up and saw everything the kids wanted to see at Sequoia Park first.
Even the park ranger discouraged trying to park hop. He said that people end up stuck in one park after dark, and it’s complicated (and somewhat dangerous) to navigate the roads out of the park at night.
Because of the lengthy nature of this blog post, I wrote a different post about the best one-day itinerary for families with kids (link below). This itinerary worked well for the kids with us on the trip, ages five, seven, eight, twelve, and fifteen. Three of them have been diagnosed with ADHD and can quickly lose interest in what’s happing, but they all did very well on this day trip.
Things you should know before taking your family to Sequoia National Park
Tip, Don’t give your kids sleepy Dramamine for motion sickness on the way into the park. Our twelve-year-old got car sick on the winding roads and needed Dramamine, but we gave her the sleepy kind, and she kept dragging her feet and saying she felt weird till after lunch.
Put your phone in airplane mode. You won’t have a good wifi signal anyway, and airplane mode will save your battery.
Once in the park, the information on Sequoia’s website was often inaccessible because of the remote location and sketchy Wi-Fi access. Download a park map ahead of time that doesn’t require wifi, or use a paper map. They give out paper maps for free on most shuttles.
Park at Wuksachi Lodge if you arrive mid to late morning on weekends and holidays. This parking is usually the last to fill up.
Take more water than you think you can drink. It’s usually hot in the park, and not having water causes a crisis.
You can’t take pinecones, sticks, rocks, etc., out of the park, so enjoy nature and leave it where you found it. Sneaking things out of the park is a fineable offense.
Copyright Annie Eklöv