Things to Do in Oakdale

Just 2 miles from the southern entrance of Yosemite National Park sits a post that passed from homesteader to cowboy to Mike and Sherry Knapp, who dubbed it Yosemite Trails Pack Station 70 years ago. Since then, three generations of Knapps have run the station, but it remains as isolated and wildlife rich as it was in 1966. Today, Larry Knapp and his team still raise cattle as well as american quarter and american paint horses in the Sierra Nevada mountains, getting them acclimated to the rocky terrain so that they can safely carry patrons on trail rides. Trails wind through Big Creek, the Vista Pass, and even venture into Yosemite’s Mariposa Grove, thick with millennia-old redwood trees. Days on horseback often culminate in cowboy cookouts with hot dogs, s’mores, and photos of ex-boyfriends roasted over the campfire. When summer fades to winter, guests can still enjoy the mountain-lined horizon on sleighs drawn by belgian draft horses.

For more than 25 years, the paddling captains at Sunshine Rafting Adventures have navigated the Stanislaus River's collection of rushing haystack rapids and shady straight-aways. The team specializes in low-risk, family-oriented rafting trips, and they organize packages that equip guests with necessary paddles and life jackets. To begin each 8-mile float, the team launches rafts near the historic Knights Ferry covered bridge—the longest covered bridge west of the Mississippi River. Guests then paddle along various features, including the Class II Russian rapids, the sharp turns of the Throw Rapids, and the lava cliffs of The Two Bluffs, where cliff swallows build hundreds of mud nests each summer. In addition, Sunshine Rafting Adventures orchestrates yoga trips and retreats along the riverbanks, pairing the exercise of paddling with the serene feeling of doing headstands with squirrels.

Visitors traveling through Challenger Learning Center's exhibits may feel they've fallen down Alice's rabbit hole. One moment, they're as tiny as a nanobot as they gaze at nanotechnology components developed for medicine, electronics, and space elevators. The next, they're giants who could bat the whole planet around with one well-aimed jump—that is, if the planet is the NASA projection globe across whose surface features of the sun, moon, and Earth flow in vivid color.

Other exhibits take visitors far out, with images snapped by the Hubble Space Telescope or deep inside, with the Body Plaza's skeletons, x-rays, and organ models. A wide slate of interactive programming engages youngsters' problem-solving and teamwork skills with activities such as simulated space missions, where they keep the astronauts entertained over the radios at mission control or assemble probes in the spacecraft while hurtling toward Mars.

A lone runner emerges on the horizon, covered completely in mud that falls from his arms in chunks. He soldiers up a hill, stopping only briefly before throwing himself between hanging car tires swaying from ropes. He’s smiling a big, goofy grin as he’s battered by the tires and exhausted by the distance—but he wouldn’t be here if he wasn't up for the challenge. Sierra Recon’s muddy courses traverse 4-, 7-, and 11-mile stretches with walls, beams, nets, and ice awaiting runners between the starting line and the after party. The race, which boasts at least two such creative obstacles each mile, attracts both daredevils and their enthusiastic entourages, who holler their encouragement from a dry deck with views of the course. Runners can choose both their difficulty and distance for the race, though all routes promise mud and creative obstacles built by licensed contractors.

The designers of Zip Yosemite, Experience Based Learning, focuses on adventure and safety in building their courses, but they also take care to look after the environment. The company uses Professional Ropes Course Association–accredited builders, who anchor single cables to trees using the Eco-Wrap system, a bolt-free method that doesn't pierce the tree and invite criticism from its grandparents. Using this system, the company can string six ziplines up to 1,000 feet long at heights of up to 80 feet through the aromatic canopies of incense cedars and ponderosa pine trees. Guides take visitors darting down these single-cable paths and across three suspension bridges. Then, they rappel toward the forest floor at one of two rappelling stations. As visitors glide through the forest, they can catch glimpses of wildlife as well as the Fresno Dome and other natural rock formations.

The nine holes of River Creek Golf Course are spread across the same granite-streaked foothills occupied by Yosemite National Park, which lies just 30 miles to the northwest. Snowcapped Sierra peaks hover above the trees as golfers contend with a John Hilborn–designed layout that welcomes golfers into its embrace with a 542-yard dogleg first hole, the longest on the course. Once players have holed out on the birdie-prone 349-yard ninth, they can head to the clubhouse, checking clubs at the door and instructing golf carts to sit and stay. Inside, the café and bar menu slakes hunger with lunch options, such as hamburgers, caesar wraps, and quesadillas, as well as beverages, including fountain drinks and premium beer.

Course at a Glance:

• Nine-hole, par-36 course
• Total length of 3,152 yards from the back tees
• Course rating of 68 from the back tees
• Course slope of 128 from the back tees
• Fives sets of tees per hole