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Free entrance to national parks during Presidents Day weekend

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National parks will waive entrance fees Saturday through Monday in honor of Presidents Day weekend. It’s the longest fee-free period of the year for national parks.

The free admission applies to more than 400 parks nationwide, including Yosemite, Joshua Tree, Death Valley and Kings Canyon-Sequoia in California. Not all federal parklands charge fees.

National forests, such as Angeles and Los Padres sites in Southern California, offer free admission on Monday only.

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Here are some parks linked to presidents you can visit during the long weekend.

--Former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, will appear at 11 a.m. Monday at the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site in their rural hometown of Plains, Ga. Both will speak about their time in the White House, and afterward Carter will autograph his books, according to the park’s Facebook page.

The historic site encompasses the entire town -- the high school, the train depot, the president’s boyhood farm and historic district. Plains is about 130 miles south of Atlanta.

--Abraham Lincoln’s birthday Thursday marks 206 years since the 16th president was born. The Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield, Ill., offers free tours of the place where Lincoln lived before being elected president in 1860. (His boyhood home, a national memorial, is in Lincoln City, Ind.)

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The Springfield historic site will host lectures and stories about the president starting at 8:30 a.m. Thursday. In Washington, D.C., there will be birthday celebrations at noon at the Lincoln Memorial with speakers as well as U.S. Coast Guard and Lincoln Memorial University musicians. It’s free and open to the public.

--George Washington’s birthday could make your head spin. He was born in Virginia on Feb. 11, 1732, on the Julian calendar. The date became Feb. 22 when Britain shifted to the Gregorian calendar. Regardless, the nation celebrates his birthday on the third Monday in February. Got that?

The Washington Monument on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., chooses to mark the first president’s birthday on Feb. 11 (Wednesday) with staff in period costumes who will tell the story of his life. All are welcome to attend at the monument’s lodge.

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