28 Best Sights in The Central Valley, California

At this combination zoo, botanical garden, and natural history museum, the emphasis is on the zoo. Within the reptile house lives every species of rattlesnake found in California. The landscaped grounds—about a 20-minute drive northeast of Bakersfield—also shelter captive bald eagles, tortoises, coyotes, black bears, and foxes. Additions in 2015 include a touch tank and jellyfish exhibit, a zip line, and a high ropes challenge course.

You can stroll among dozens of restored military aircraft at this outdoor facility. The vintage war birds include the B-25 Mitchell medium-range bomber—best known for the Jimmy Doolittle raid on Tokyo after the attack on Pearl Harbor—and the speedy SR-71 Blackbird, used for reconnaissance over Vietnam and Libya. A recently arrived star is an aircraft that from 1974 to 2006 was known as Air Force One whenever it transported the U.S president.

This 16-acre site is one of the Central Valley's top museum complexes. The indoor-outdoor Kern County Museum is an open-air, walk-through historic village with more than 55 restored or re-created buildings dating from the 1860s to the 1940s. "Black Gold: The Oil Experience," a permanent exhibit, shows how oil is created, discovered, extracted, and transformed for various uses. The Lori Brock Children's Discovery Center, for ages eight and younger, has hands-on displays and an indoor playground.

A cadre of sweet, well-informed volunteers runs this jam-packed throwback of a museum that's bigger than it looks from the outside. With exhibits about Lake Isabella, minerals and gems, old tools and farming implements, pioneer and native life, and Hollywood Westerns shot in the area, you’ll likely find something to intrigue you.

The 62-mile self-guided Blossom Trail driving tour takes in Fresno-area orchards, citrus groves, and vineyards during spring blossom season. The trail passes through small towns and past rivers, lakes, and canals. The most colorful and aromatic time to go is from late February to mid-March, when almond, plum, apple, apricot, and peach blossoms shower the landscape with shades of white, pink, and red. After the blossoms mature, the route is known as the Fruit Trail.

You can witness the everyday abundance of the Modesto area with a visit here; on offer are tasty samples, a film about almond growing, and many roasts and flavors of almonds, as well as other nuts.

Worth a brief look if you're in town—for the photo op, if nothing else—this frozen-in-time street holds the last remains of Hanford's once-bustling Chinatown. The centerpiece is the 1893 Taoist Temple. The alley's other buildings of note include the decaying L.T. Sue Herb building.

The zoo's most striking exhibit is its tropical rain forest, where you'll encounter exotic birds along paths and bridges. Elsewhere at the zoo live tigers, sloth bears, sea lions, tule elk, camels, elephants, and siamang apes. The facility has a high-tech reptile house and there's a petting zoo.

In pretty Victory Park, the Haggin has one of the Central Valley's finest art collections. Highlights include landscapes by Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Moran, a still life by Paul Gauguin, a Native American gallery, and an Egyptian mummy.

Fashions, furnishings, toys, and military artifacts at this living-history museum tell the region's story. The facility is inside the former Carnegie Library, a Romanesque-style building dating from 1905.

A downtown walking tour follows the iconic 1950s-era cruise route portrayed in Modesto native George Lucas's 1973 film American Graffiti. The path's 25 historic kiosk markers provide details about the filmmaker, the people and places that inspired him, and Modesto's history. The tour loops around 10th and 11th streets between K and G streets—start at 10th and K.

The prosperity that water brought to Modesto has attracted people from all over the world. The city holds a well-attended International Heritage Festival in early October that celebrates the cultures, crafts, and cuisines of many nationalities.

Shaded by ancient oak trees, an 1870s farm building houses the tasting room of this winery whose vineyards and horse ranch have been in the same family since 1863. In addition to producing old-vine Zinfandels, it presents blues, country, and rock concerts on some summer Saturdays. A second tasting room, open on weekends, is downtown at 27 East Locust Street.

The drive along palm-lined Kearney Boulevard is one of the best reasons to visit the museum, which stands in shaded 225-acre Kearney Park. The century-old home of M. Theo Kearney, Fresno's onetime "raisin king," is accessible only on guided 45-minute tours.

The featured attraction here is the 355-foot-long Knights Ferry covered bridge. The beautiful and haunting structure, built in 1863, crosses the Stanislaus River near the ruins of an old gristmill. The park has camping, picnic, and barbecue areas along the riverbanks, as well as campgrounds accessible only by boat. You can hike, fish, canoe, and raft on miles of rapids.

A rancher and banker built the 1883 McHenry Mansion, the city's sole surviving original Victorian home. The Italianate mansion has been decorated to reflect Modesto life in the late 19th century. Its period-appropriate wallpaper is especially impressive.

The best exhibits at this repository of early Modesto and Stanislaus County memorabilia include the re-creations of an old-time dentist's office, a blacksmith's shop, and a schoolroom. Also worth a peek are the extensive doll collection and a general store stocked with period goods such as hair crimpers and corsets.

Along the Blossom Trail, roughly halfway between Fresno and Visalia, the colorful handiwork of local quilters is on display at the Mennonite Quilt Center. Try to visit on Monday (except holidays) between 8 and noon, when two dozen quilters stitch, patch, and chat over coffee. Prime viewing time—with the largest number of quilts—is in February and March, before the center's early-April auction. Ask a docent to take you to the locked upstairs room, where most of the quilts hang; you'll learn about the fine points of patterns such as the Log Cabin Romance, the Dahlia, and the Snowball-Star.

Built in 1875, the courthouse is a striking example of Victorian Italianate style. The upper two floors contain a museum of early Merced history whose highlights include ornate restored courtrooms and an 1870 Chinese temple with carved redwood altars.

The center displays paintings, sculpture, and photography and presents plays and concerts.

A restored 1889 Victorian, "the Meux" contains furnishings typical of an upper-class household in early Fresno. The house's namesake, Thomas Richard Meux, was a Confederate army doctor during the Civil War who became a family practitioner after moving to Fresno. The Meux can be viewed on guided tours only.

This lake at the top of Friant Dam is a great place for boating, fishing, camping, and summertime swimming. The lake and its surrounding hills are wintering grounds for bald eagles, and boat tours are available to view the birds between December and February.

You can partake of the southern Central Valley's agricultural bounty at the farm's Big Red Barn location—owners Steve and Vickie Murray promise more free samples than Costco, and they deliver. You'll find whatever's in season, including peaches, plums, apricots, and 18 cherry varieties. There are prepared foods, too, and activities for kids (jumping pillow, petting zoo, hay rides, AstroTurf sledding hill). The Cal-Okie Kitchen sells tasty fry pies filled with eggs and other ingredients for breakfast and pulled chicken and other meats for lunch and dinner.

You can sample the wares at this homey factory complex, which has tastings (try the aged Gouda) and cheese-making tours, a store, and a bakery. Outside are a picnic area and a petting zoo.

The restored brick buildings of a former lumber-industry district now hold antiques shops, art galleries, restaurants, and saloons. At the visitor center (or online) you can access a walking-tour map. To get here from Fresno, head east on Herndon Avenue for about 10 miles to Clovis Avenue and drive south. Not much is open on Sunday.

Tree-shaded Roeding Park is a place of respite on hot summer days; it has picnic areas, playgrounds, tennis courts, horseshoe pits, and a zoo. A train, little race cars, paddleboats, a carousel, and other rides for kids are among the amusements at Playland. Children can explore attractions with fairy-tale themes at Rotary Storyland.

The collection at the largest military museum west of the Mississippi includes Japanese, German, and American uniforms, German bayonets and daggers, a Japanese Namby pistol, a Gatling gun, and nearly 20,000 other items. The museum is also home of the Legion of Valor, dedicated to those who have received the nation's highest decorations for heroism and service. The staff is extremely enthusiastic.

The Central Valley's largest urban park, with 300 acres of jogging trails, picnic areas, and playgrounds, is especially pretty in spring, when plum and cherry trees, magnolias, and camellias bloom. Outdoor concerts take place in summer. The Shinzen Friendship Garden (shinzenjapanesegarden.org) has a teahouse, a koi pond, arched bridges, a waterfall, and Japanese art.