National Park Service announces 16 fee-free days in ’16 to celebrate 100th birthday

With the National Park Service turning 100 years old in 2016, you’ll have more chances than ever to visit a national park without paying an entrance fee.

NPS announced Wednesday it will extend its waiver of entrance fees at all national parks, including Glacier and Yellowstone, during its centennial year.

That includes nine consecutive days in April, for National Park Week, and four straight days in August.

Aug. 25 is traditionally a fee-free day already — that’s the date in 1916 that President Woodrow Wilson signed the Organic Act, which created the National Park Service and gave it its mandate.

In 2016, NPS will extend the traditional waiver of fees that day, which falls on a Thursday, through the weekend, making Aug. 25-28 fee-free.

There will be no charge to enter any national park between April 16 and April 24, either.

Other traditional fee-free days will also be observed: Jan. 18 (Martin Luther King Jr. Day), Sept. 24 (National Public Lands Day) and Nov. 11 (Veterans Day).