Which Way in California?

99 & 395 are very different types of roads. Simple explanation goes like this. 99 is a freeway. 395 is part 4 lane divided road, part two lane. 395 is desert. 99 is Central Valley. If you want to see Big Pine & Carson City, 395 is the one. There are far too many great things to see along the route to enumerate. Tons of little streams & lakes along the way. Mammoth & June Lake loop. Convict Lake is pretty spectacular. Leave the towable at a site & do a day trip up Tioga Pass. There are small non-hook-ups campgrounds up there but at that altitude at that time of year weather can get nasty. (Donner Pass isn't that much further north. You know what happened there!) There are definitely ways to cross the Sierra in RV's. I took a Class C up 50 & around Tahoe about 2 decades ago. We recently took our 37' Class A gasser pulling a C-RV over I-80. Even stopped for a snack near Donner Pass. To access Yosemite, Sequoia & King's Canyon you will need to come at them from the western slopes of the Sierra eventually. Though I haven't done it, I like the suggestion of 88 to cross the mountains. There's reputed to be a great RV park near Jackson. Then use 49 along the lower western Sierra to access the parks. Either take your whole rig into the parks (I'd start checking for availability now) or park the towable and day trip it. (Our last trip to Sequoia, we left the motorhome in Visalia & drove the car. Long day, but hugely worth it. I'd highly recommend lunch at the lodge.). You can spend a great deal more than 2 months exploring either of these areas. Watch the weather. Big winds come off the eastern Sierra in the afternoons at times. And snow is certainly possible at the higher elevations. One of our best excursions was into Yosemite Valley during a snow storm just after Christmas. Fortunately had just the 4wd drive vehicle for it!

A couple of interesting stops along 395 East of Yosemite include Mono Lake & Bodie Ghost Town. As others noted, you only have a few roads crossing the Sierras.

and end up in Carson City, Nevada. My questions is that it doesn't seem to have access to the Devils Canyon/Sequoia Parks? Is there something missing on my map/routing software or do I have to take the Western route 99, which doesn't look to be as good a road, and is a bit out of our way, to get to them?

When going north on US 395 when you arrive at Minden/Gardnerville take SR 88 over the Sierras and that will get you into the Stockton area. From there it is fairly easy to access Yosemite and Sequoia and, of course, San Francisco, the Pacific Ocean and the Giant Redwoods. You can take a few short miles detour and visit Lake Tahoe off SR 88 as well. The great American author Mark Twain in his book Roughing It called Lake Tahoe 'the fairest picture the whole earth affords, it's air is the air the angels breathe'. It is worth a visit. There are other passes over the Sierras south of SR 88 but SR 4 Ebbetts is not all that RV trailer friendly and is narrow in places and so is the top section of SR 108 Sonora Pass. SR 88 is a very RV friendly route as is US 50 and IR 80.

395 is a beautiful drive. Through Yosemite via 120 you can travel to the 99 south then out of Fresno on 180 to Kings. The Kings Canyon is really out of your way on the trip you have planned but it's a scenic drive for the most part.
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Personally, I'd come across the Northern route. September won't be too bad. Start with the Giant Redwoods and head south on US101. Lots to see along that route including the Golden Gate. Continue south through Pismo Beach and Morro Bay. Once you get to Watsonville, (Artichoke Capital of the World) head east across Hecker Pass to Gilroy, (Garlic Capital of the World) Don't miss the pier at Santa Cruz. Continue southeast to Fresno and take 180 to Kings Canyon. There are no roads from Kings to US395. Return to US 99 and head north to Yosemite. From there you can pick up US395 and proceed north. Be sure to visit Lake Tahoe. A pleasant side trip is to follow the road completely around the lake. There's an RV park on the Nevada side, Zephyr Cove that's really nice. Use the toad to circle the lake. Take pictures and a picnic lunch. From Reno, you can take US395 until it dead ends at Hwy 20. Turn east and you'll end up in Boise Idaho. If the weather looks bad, take I-80 out of Reno to Salt Lake City.


Obviously there's a bunch more stuff to see in that route. If this is your first trip to California, I'd skip the Kings Canyon leg and use that time to see a lot of the other things along the way......Dennis

That section of the Sierra's does not have any roads because it's a huge mountain range right through there. Have to go around.