Tulare County

The county in brief

A traveler's read on Tulare County

The Generals Highway between Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks holds a hard 22-ft rig length cap on the section above Hospital Rock — a switchback geometry constraint published by NPS at every entrance station, and one of only three NPS units in the country with a sub-25-ft cap on its primary scenic corridor.

Tulare County climbs from the 250-ft Tulare Lake basin (the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi until 1898 agricultural drainage) to 14,505-ft Mt. Whitney on the Sierra crest, with Visalia (population 141,384) the Central Valley resupply anchor. The General Sherman Tree at 275 ft and a base circumference of 102 ft is the largest single-stem living thing on Earth by volume; the parking loop at the trailhead accepts rigs up to 30 ft.