Death Valley and Sequoia may be close geographically, but as roads go, they are no where near each other. We drove into the night one day and the morning of the next through mountains, orchards, small towns, Hollywood sets, and finally we arrived at Sequoia. It is amazing what 5000 feet in elevation gain can do. The temperature dropped over 50 degrees and the landscape became so much more enjoyable. To sum up Sequoia I can say it has: really big trees (the General Sherman tree is the largest by volume in the world), really rugged country and really big crowds. I am not saying that your average tourist is lazy, however, as soon as we hiked about 1/2 a mile down a trail we had the entire forest of these massive trees all to ourselves and we even saw bears, a mother and her two cubs. We hiked, we camped, we saw a lot.
Kings Canyon National Park, which is now park of Sequoia, has the Grant tree, which is the second largest tree in the world. It also boasts an amazing sheer cliff garnet Canyon which is said to be the deepest in the lower 48. You and half a million of your closest tourist friends can drive most of the way through it in a day and it is well worth the drive.
You have some awesome photos. Hopefully the bears weren't really as close as the picture looks.
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