The climb from the San Joaquin Valley up Highway 180 is a lesson in how quickly California changes. You leave orange groves and dusty fields near Squaw Valley, wind up through oak and chaparral, and within an hour you are riding among sugar pines and giant sequoias at well over 1,800 metres.
Grant Grove is home to the General Grant tree, one of the largest living things on the planet and officially named the Nation's Christmas Tree. It is a short, easy walk from the parking area through a grove of giants, and standing at the base of one of these trees is humbling. Nearby is the Fallen Monarch, a hollow sequoia trunk that has been used as a home, a saloon and a stable for the cavalry who patrolled the park in its early years.
The Big Stump area, just inside the entrance, tells another story. In the late nineteenth century loggers cut many sequoias here, only to find that the brittle wood often shattered when the trees fell. The stumps and debris are still there, a monument to wasted effort. One giant was cut and sent in sections to an exhibition in the East, where people refused to believe it was real.
The riding up to here is excellent: a well-graded road with long sweeping curves and some tighter bends, good surface and wide views back over the foothills. Traffic can be heavy in summer, especially on weekends, and there are often slow vehicles and tour buses. Early morning is best for both traffic and light. In winter the road is open to Grant Grove but snow chains may be required.
There are restaurants, a market, a visitor centre and lodging at Grant Grove, but fuel is not reliably available in the park, so fill up in the valley before you climb, at Squaw Valley or around Orange Cove. Hume Lake, a little further on, sometimes has fuel in season, but do not rely on it. The road continues east from here and descends into the depths of Kings Canyon, one of the deepest canyons in North America.