Bargain! Free entrance to national parks and monuments

Want to visit the Cabrillo National Monument? Or Joshua Tree National Park? How about Yosemite?

Here’s your chance to get free entrance to those sites and dozens of other locations in the National Park Service system.

A hundreds years have passed since President Woodrow Wilson created the federal agency that runs these parks. In honor of the centennial, the National Park Service will waive entrance fees during two weekends this month for more than 100 of the properties it manages. The dates are April 15 and 16, and then April 22 and 23.

In addition to the three locations already mentioned, other places in California that will be free during the two designated weekends in April include Death Valley, Pinnacles and Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks, as well as several national monuments.

The special offer doesn’t extend to reservations for camping, concessions or tours.

For the rest of this year, regularly offered free-entrance dates will be Aug. 25, the National Park Service’s birthday; Sept. 30, which is National Public Lands Day; and Nov. 11 and 12, to commemorate Veterans Day.

By the way, the National Park Service oversees more than 400 sites that already are free year-round.

Twitter: @jemersmith

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Email: joshua.smith@sduniontribune.com