A super common question a lot of visitors have before visiting Yosemite is, what is the best way to get around?
Having a car or RV is pivotal in being able to see all that Yosemite has to offer. Yosemite Valley has the highest concentration of shuttles in the park, but the other sections are around an away from one another without any good means of transportation. It can often take 30-90 minutes to get from one area in the park to the next. Yosemite is a pretty massive park, so having a car is a necessity.
I’m Juliana, a Southern California-based college student, and I had the privilege of growing up visiting Yosemite nearly every year, and I lived there last summer. Keep reading for some of my helpful tips when planning your trip to Yosemite.
Make your trip planning EASY, avoid the crowds, and see places most people don’t know about
Inside the guide:
*Step-by-step plan that will take you to the best hikes, viewpoints, drives, and must-do stops
*Exact time-frames and star-ratings so you can make the best use of your time and money
*Best Friend Guarantee: love it or get your money back
*Stay in the right spot with our area recommendations to reduce time driving and waiting in entrance lines
Four of the entrances are on the West side of the park and one is on the East. They are all over an hour from each other and access a different part of the park.
The most popular is the Rock Arch entrance, because it is only a 5-minute drive to Yosemite Valley, the most popular area of the park. It often has the most traffic and the longest wait times to enter.
The South entrance is the closest to Mariposa Grove, which houses Yosemite’s only giant sequoias. This is slightly less trafficked than Arch Rock but also comes with a cost of being an additional 45-minute drive to Yosemite Valley. Some argue that this is the best entrance for first-time visitors, as your first look at the valley is through Yosemite’s majestic Tunnel View.
There are also two lesser-known entrances, with one called Big Flat Oak, while the other is the entrance to Hetch Hetchy. Big Flat Oak is the most remote and least accessible, which is why it isn’t very favorable to most visitors.
Hetch Hetchy is a much more secluded part of the park that most first-time visitors do not usually bother to visit, as there is much more to do elsewhere within the park.
Lastly, the Tioga Pass Entrance on the East side of the park is best for those road-tripping from the East. It is only open from late May to November due to snowfall and is less trafficked than the Arch Rock and South Entrances. This has a gnarly but beautiful 2-hour drive into the valley.
Read more about entrances in our article What is the Best Entrance to Yosemite? Yosemite’s 5 Entrances.
Only Yosemite Valley and Wawona are open year-round. Yosemite Valley has the most famous parts of Yosemite including Yosemite, Vernal, and Nevada Falls, El Capitan, the Merced River, and the historic Ahwahnee Hotel.
The roads to the rest of the park, such as Tioga Road and Glacier Point Road, are closed from November to May.
The exact dates vary from year to year depending on the timing and amount of snowfall Yosemite’s high country gets. You can hike up to Glacier Point from Yosemite Valley, but it is not for the faint of heart.
When the roads are open, shuttles are available throughout the park, with the highest and best concentration within Yosemite Valley. Two free bus routes cover the Valley floor and are the best way to get around without having to battle for a parking spot all day.
They can get packed in the summer, but they are still the best way to see the Valley.
There are a few shuttles that service Yosemite. The main ones to know about are the two that service Yosemite Valley. They run every 8-22 minutes from 7 am to 10 pm in the summer. They are free and operate year-round, though may have shorter hours in the winter. Although you can drive your car in Yosemite Valley, the parking lots are full most of the day. Taking the shuttle alleviates the stress of trying to find parking.
The shuttles serving the Mariposa Grove area are especially important, since the only other way to see the sequoias is by hiking about 2 miles. These free shuttles run approximately every 15 minutes from around April 15 through November 30, depending on weather conditions. Visitors can catch the shuttle at the Mariposa Grove Welcome Plaza for transportation to and from the grove. Private vehicle are not allowed while the shuttles are running.
You can learn more about these shuttles and other shuttle services available in the park at Yosemite’s website, here.
The best way to visit the rest of the park is in your own vehicle.
CHECK OUT: How to Get to Yosemite: Airports, Roads, and Shuttles
Traffic and parking are diffecult during peak season, which is from June to August. Yosemite Valley is hit the hardest, as it is the most popular part of the park, and it is best practice to enter early to find parking at Curry Village or the visitor center. This is the main hub for shuttles in and around the valley floor.
Finding a parking spot elsewhere in the valley and commuting to a shuttle stop may also be worth it. In short, find a parking spot and try everything in your power not to leave it unless you are leaving the Valley.
When parking fills up, it isn’t uncommon for visitors to be turned away at Yosemite Valley. To avoid this, try to arrive before 8 am or after 4 pm when people begin leaving for the day.
Glacier Point and Wawona also get relatively busy, and parking is relatively limited. The key here is to be patient, turn up your music, and wait for a spot to open up. This usually happens within 15-25 minutes.
Traffic begins before you enter the park, with lines to gate entrances often adding 1-2 hours to your commute.
We recommend downloading a few podcasts or playlists or having some fun games to play to pass the time, as it can get really boring, really fast. There is also no cell service at any entrance, so don’t expect to rely on that.
Yosemite really rewards those who enter early. It is worth it to wake up early, as wait times are low and parking spaces are abundant. Sunrise is incredible from any viewpoint in the park, and an afternoon nap by the beach or floating down the Merced is magical.
Yosemite is an RVer’s dream! RVs are allowed nearly everywhere within the park, although with some restrictions on size and length. Specific designated parking spots are available in each section of the park, although, like all visitors in the park, they can be hard to come by at times.
Glacier Point, Mariposa Grove, and Hetch-Hetchy all have length restrictions that you can see here. Although there isn’t a restriction for Tioga Road, it can be scary and tricky to navigate if you are pulling a trailer.
It is best to have a rig that is 25 feet or less and has a max clearance of 13’0 in order to access all roads and routes in Yosemite. For those with bigger rigs, camping inside the park allows RVs up to 45 feet in specific campsites but most campsites only accommodate rigs less than 30 feet.
Gas stations are pretty hard to come by in Yosemite. There are 6 main stations within and around the park, but because Yosemite is so massive, they are all very far apart. The most convenient 24-hour gas stations are located in Wawona, El Portal, and Crane Flat.
Make sure you budget a considerable bit more than normal for gas, as it can be upwards of $1 more per gallon than what you can find in Fresno, the nearest real city. It is best to plan to get gas and make it a point to begin to look for a station before you get below a quarter tank. You do not want to be stranded in or around Yosemite after dark.
Getting gas on the way into the park near Fresno, Oakhurst, or Mammoth is a great idea, especially because it will be considerably cheaper than that inside/near the park. There is no gas available in the Valley, Glacier Point, or Hetch Hetchy.
EV charging is slowly becoming more available within the park. Currently, the Ahwahnee Hotel, Yosemite Valley Lodge, Valley Welcome Center, Curry Village (west lot), and Yosemite Falls parking all have level 2 chargers, ranging from 4 to 20 chargers per location. They are all free, but I am sure they are difficult to come by during peak season.
There are charging stations located outside each main entrance, although it can be a bit of a drive with not much to do around. As with gas, I would advise going to Oakhurst, Fresno, or Mammoth on your first day in/last day out of the park. You will be treated with great cell service and reasonably priced facilities, unlike what you will find close to the park.
Scoring a spot in the Valley would be fantastic, but I would not bank on it. There are a total of 48 chargers in a park that sees roughly 19,000 visitors a day during peak season.
Cell coverage is extremely spotty throughout the park. Downloading maps and music prior to entering is a must in my book. About 45 minutes out for each entrance, there is nearly no cell service. Keep this in mind, knowing that you may be waiting in line to enter for an hour or more without service. A long playlist or podcast really comes in handy here.
Within the Valley, service comes and goes, sometimes with four bars but often with none. Many overlooks at the end of hikes tend to have some sort of service, such as Vernal Falls, Nevada Falls, Glacier Point, Sentinel Dome, and Taft Point. Overall, you won’t have great service most of the time.
This brings me to auto emergencies. Because service is very often unreliable, sometimes it is best to flag someone else down to get help or find a spot with enough service to call for help. If you end up in an auto emergency and are lucky enough to have service, call 911 or Yosemite Dispatch at 209-379-1992 for less urgent issues.
We recommend trying to make it back to or near your lodging (if outside the park) within 30 minutes of sunset due to the dark, windy, one-lane roads that can be pretty scary to be stuck on should you have any emergency.
Make your trip planning EASY, avoid the crowds, and see places most people don’t know about
Inside the guide:
*Step-by-step plan that will take you to the best hikes, viewpoints, drives, and must-do stops
*Exact time-frames and star-ratings so you can make the best use of your time and money
*Best Friend Guarantee: love it or get your money back
*Stay in the right spot with our area recommendations to reduce time driving and waiting in entrance lines
No. Whether you want to enter Yosemite National Park or just pass through, you must pay for a park pass. The only time when this is not the case is when entrance stations are not staffed. This is typically from 7:00 pm to 4:00 am, and the parks ask that you pay on your way out of the park.
It definitely depends on the person, but for the most part, no. The two ‘scarier’ roads are Wawona and El Portal Roads, which are located on the west and south entrances. Wawona Road is inside the park and is incredibly windy, with steep cliffs at times. El Portal Road is the road leading into the West entrance of the park and is very secluded, following the Merced River with a lot of animal activity.
It is a bit difficult to avoid both these roads, but they are very safe. The scariest part about them is the fact that cell service is not available. We recommend avoiding driving these roads, in particular, after dark, as it can get a bit nerve-racking even for seasoned locals like me.
Not at all. The ‘hardest’ part is finding a place to park and battling the traffic. All roads are paved and signs are frequent. For navigation, downloading a map prior to your visit can help you get around a bit more smoothly.
Nope! All roads are fully paved and accessible.
See the map below for drive times to popular sites within Yosemite.
No. Yosemite removed its timed entry requirement in 2026.
YOSEMITE TRIP PLANNER: To read or watch all of our content about Yosemite National Park, check out our Yosemite Homepage.
THINGS TO DO: Don’t miss all that Yosemite has to offer, including hiking, things to do in Yosemite Valley, and floating the Merced River.
WHERE TO EAT: Don’t miss the best places to eat in Yosemite National Park
WHERE TO STAY: Learn all you need to know about where to stay inside and outside the park
KNOW BEFORE YOU GO: Find out how to get there, the best time to visit, which is the best entrance, and all about driving around Yosemite.
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