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The state of New Mexico's Department of Cultural Affairs and Tourism has partnered with Travelocity to produce the New Mexico CulturePass.
For $25, the pass provides admission to 14 state-run museums and monuments, a 50 percent savings over what it would cost if you visited them all and paid full-price. The pass is good for a year.
The pass covers the New Mexico...

There are still plenty of hotel rooms available for the Beijing Olympics.
Director of Beijing's Tourism Bureau Zhang Huiguang says the crunch that was predicted doesn't seem to be happening.
She said that about 500,000 foreigners were expected for the games, a figure Beijing officials have long been predicting.
She said only 77 percent of capacity at Beijing's five-star hotels have been booked during...

Tourists applauded firefighters Monday as Universal Studios reopened, while investigators examined the ruins of some of the most famous sets in Hollywood to find the cause of the spectacular weekend blaze.
When the gates opened, hundreds of people streamed into the venerable movie studio-theme park, which was closed Sunday after the early...

European Union inspectors say bathing water in 95 percent of beaches tested around the bloc's coastline last summer meets its mandatory cleanliness tests.
However, the picture is patchy, with Romania and Slovenia falling well below the average, and Italy forced to ban swimming at 300 beaches throughout the season.
Just 28.6 percent of Romania's Black Sea beaches have passed the EU test. The...

Impressionist paintings by four women will be the focus of an exhibition at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco this summer.
The exhibition, "Women Impressionists: Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Eva Gonzales, Marie Bracquemond," will run June 21-Sept. 21.
The museum says that in the 19th century, these painters were "marginalized because of strict social rules and the artists' gender" and that they...

INDIANAPOLIS - Nine bulky luggage scanners worth $1 million each wait silently beneath the new terminal, poised to check for explosives at a combined rate of 3,600 bags an hour.
Concrete bollards guard the main doors. Blast-resistant glass fills the front windows of the $1.1 billion terminal at Indianapolis International Airport, which...

By now, you've heard that American Airlines is charging many of its passengers an additional $15 fee for their
We've entered a new era of air travel -- one dominated by fees for services that were once included in the ticket price.
The fee hikes have been spurred by escalating fuel prices....

With the slumping economy and weak dollar value overseas, cruise lines are sending SOS signals to North American consumers to get onboard and sail away.
"Competition among cruise lines for your vacation dollars is intense," says Stewart Chiron, a cruise industry expert who is nationally recognized as
Chiron has uncovered some incredible deals that are hard to pass up. A few even...

Sixty years after the first blast signaled work had begun on the world's largest mountain carving, the project is far from finished.
The carved face of Crazy Horse has been completed and a welcome center and museum are open, but the carving of the Lakota warrior's body, his horse, and a planned...

The parking lots have reopened as Universal Studios gets back to business a day after a blaze tore through a two-block swath of film sets on grounds of the Southern California attraction.
NBC Universal says the theme park will open Monday at 10 a.m.
Authorities are trying to determine the cause of Sunday's fire that destroyed some of Hollywood's most famous backdrops.
The fire...

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Combine skyrocketing oil prices and congested airports with a reduction in services, and you have the perfect formula for agonizing flight delays. So as travelers, do we have any alternative options?
The answer, surprisingly, is yes -- if you don't mind taking a trip back to the future. For a growing number of travelers, trains and buses have become viable alternatives...

LONDON - Queen Elizabeth II has made a farewell visit to the Queen Elizabeth 2 cruise liner before it is retired later this year.
The monarch launched the ship in Scotland in 1969, and she was in Southampton on Monday for a last tour.
The ship is due to make its last voyage...

"The meals on this airline are terrible -- and the portions are so small!" Airline food has been the province of stand-up comedians for years, but the new offerings for sky-high dining are no joke -- at least not in first and business class, and especially not on leading international carriers that use food and drink to woo customers.
Money is behind...

Queen Elizabeth II has made a farewell visit to Queen Elizabeth 2, the famed cruise liner which is retiring later this year.
The monarch launched the ship in Scotland in 1969, and she was in Southampton on Monday for a last tour.
The ship is due to make its last voyage in November when it sails to Dubai to become a floating hotel.
The...