In planning upcoming trips, I have been surprised how often payments can be made using PayPal.com; it’s common when booking tours. Planning for a trip that would begin in July 2015, I used PayPal to pay for the Blue Line Ferry from Ancona, Italy, to Split, Croatia, and to pay for a tour in England that would include a visit to a home in the Cotswolds for lunch.

Be aware that if you choose to use PayPal, there will be a 2.5% currency-conversion fee when making purchases not in dollars...

Local stonemasons, with the assistance of UNESCO, in July finished restoring 14 mausoleums in the city of Timbuktu, Mali, three years after Islamic fundamentalists destroyed them. 

Timbuktu dates back to the 13th century, and the entire city is a UNESCO World Heritage site. Its 16 mausoleums, one-room  structures made of stone and mud, are the burial sites and shrines of the city’s founders, considered saints, a status deemed blasphemous by the fundamentalists who invaded the city in...

Nearly 20 crocodiles can be seen up close in Hartley’s Lagoon, 40 minutes north of Cairns, at Hartley’s Crocodile Adventures (Captain Cook Hwy., Wangetti Beach, Queensland 4879, Australia; phone +61 7 4055 3576, www.crocodileadventures.com).

Also, lizards and turtles can be seen on self-guided walks along with cassowaries and other tropical birds in a walk-through aviary. There is an interpretive educational center, and tours of the Crocodile Farm show how the sustainable commercial...