Rent a Car in Sacramento

Downtown Sacramento, Midtown and Old Sacramento's riverfront are compact enough to explore on foot or with light rail, but California's capital is really valuable as a launchpad — it sits almost exactly between the Sierra Nevada and the Bay Area's wine country, and neither is reachable by train in any practical way. A hire car turns Sacramento into a base for Lake Tahoe's beaches and casinos about two hours east, the Gold Country mining towns of the Sierra foothills less than an hour away, and Napa and Sonoma's wineries roughly 90 minutes west.

The city is also the gateway to Yosemite National Park, about three hours southeast, making a Sacramento base workable for visitors splitting time between the capital, wine country and the Sierra. Even a shorter trip benefits from a car: the historic Gold Rush towns of Placerville and Sutter Creek along Highway 49 make an easy half-day loop that public transport simply doesn't reach.