[fr_freak]

If you are a senior, you can buy a pass that lets you go to all free

Eh...if you have to buy it, it's not free. And you don't have to be a senior, though seniors might get a greater discount. A couple of years ago I bought a national park pass for $80 that let me enter any national park or monument for a year without further charge (the big ones, like Yellowstone, will charge $20 per person for a week).

[bert]

yes, you do pay for the pass.

For us it is one of the best deals there is

[T-Bone Texan]

I look for value, always have.

As a young man I found that the gates to National Parks are not staffed 24 hours a day. It has to do with budgets, I was told.

I used to backpack a lot and I used Yosemite to traverse the Sierra Nevada Mountains, as it was the only mountain pass for a hundred miles north or south, almost. I’d get to the back entrance of Yosemite at 3 am and it would be unstaffed, so I’d just drive on in.

They would catch me on the way out though, and make me pay.

The solution was to both enter the park at night and exit at night. I’ve been to most NPs in the west outside of Alaska, and found this to be a winning tactic.