Mountains & Landscapes

Although just about every bend in Tioga Road reveals another awesome view, here are three stops you won't want to miss on the eastern section at Tioga Pass.

Yosemite's Tunnel View with Half Dome, Valley View with Merced River, Glacier Point, Olmsted Point, and Tenya Lake are the most famous views in the park.

During the earth's last ice age, massive glaciers moved down from the Sierra Nevada's high country, polishing not just the mountain peaks and iconic granite domes, but also softening and widening Yosemite's ancient valleys and canyons.

Apart from its grand waterfalls, Yosemite National Park is best known for its towering granite rock formations and epic Sierra Nevada mountain peaks, a couple of which rise above a breathtaking 14,000 feet. But to enjoy these natural wonders, you don't have to be an accomplished alpinist or an expert rock climber.

Toward the end of Earth's last ice age, huge glaciers moved down from the Sierra Nevada high country carrying debris that scoured and polished Yosemite's granite rocks to a smooth surface.

Arguably the most spectacular view in the park is at the end of Glacier Point Road with the curved tooth of Half Dome prominently in the foreground.

Yosemite’s cliffs, domes, and valleys are products of powerful forces. Watch a video about the past and 2 remaining Sierra glaciers, Maclure and Lyell.

Half Dome is 8,800 feet of towering granite and a world-renowned destination for hikers. It is a 14-16-mile roundtrip hike and takes about 10-12 hours

This picturesque canyon borders the east edge of Yosemite. To drive the 12-mile byway thru the Inyo National Forest, start at Yosemite’s Tioga Pass Entrance

Take time to explore the granite domes and craggy peaks of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks and the eastern Sierra Nevada.

There's a lifetime's worth of wonders waiting inside Yosemite, but don't worry– you've got time to see all the highlights, even on a short vacation.

The soundscape of Yosemite is just as important of a natural resource to the park as its mountain peaks and rushing waterfalls.

Signs of Yosemite’s glacial past are everywhere. Follow these tips on what to look for and where to find them.

Yosemite National Park’s Mammoth Peak may be renamed in honor of 19th century female preservationist Jessie Benton Fremont. The measure would be a tribute to a woman who worked doggedly to preserve the land that would become Yosemite in 1890.

To get a good look at evidence of rockfall in any season, just follow the easy walking trails that lead right up to base of the valley's famous waterfalls, including Yosemite Falls and Bridalveil Fall.

In early Spring, Snow Plants pop their bright scarlet heads up through the snow. "It looks like a neon red psychedelic asparagus."

At 8,600 feet they are one of the highest elevation meadows in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. A single road, Tioga Pass Road makes them accessible by car.

Learn how volcanoes, glaciers and erosion from millions of years ago shaped today's gorgeous landscape of Yosemite National Park.

Beauty of Yosemite you could never even begin to imagine. By Project Yosemite

Yosemite’s wildflowers may be small in scale but they are just as showy as the park’s dramatic domes, waterfalls and giant trees. See poppies, shooting stars, lupine, lilies, monkey flower, paintbrush, and columbine

The Yosemite region encompasses a diversity of life zones, rising from the foothills of California's Central Valley into high country of the Sierra Nevada.