Yosemite National Park

Yosemite became a national park in 1890 and covers an area almost as big as Rhode Island! The park's most famous landmark is Half Dome, a massive granite cliff that looks like someone cut a mountain in half. Yosemite Falls is one of the tallest waterfalls in North America - it's so tall that if you dropped a penny from the top, it would take 6 seconds to hit the bottom! The park is home to black bears, mountain lions, and over 400 species of animals. Some of the giant sequoia trees in Yosemite are over 2,000 years old and so big that you could drive a car through tunnels carved in their trunks. Native American tribes like the Ahwahneechee lived in this valley for thousands of years before it became a national park.