Travel Briefs

The Botswana Tourism Organization has created four brochures, each showcasing a region’s attractions. They’re available in print or PDF format or on CD. In addition to maps, photos and articles about sites to visit, the 42- to 46-page guides have info about Customs, border posts, communication and national parks. Visit www.botswanatourism.us and click on “Request Literature.”

In the hotel district of Cancún, Mexico, the Maya Museum (Kukulkan Blvd., phone 01 998 885 3842, [website in Spanish only]) opened Nov. 1, 2012. Its three 4,400-square-foot exhibition halls, with sections of architecture, include more than 350 artifacts (pottery, everyday objects, etc.) plus 14,000-year-old Maya skeletons discovered in underwater caves. Open 10 a.m.- 7p.m. Tues.-Sun.; closes 10 p.m. Thurs. Admission near $5 but in pesos; adults over 60 and children under 13, free.

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Record holder for longest-running play, Agatha Christie’s “The Mousetrap” debuted in London’s West End on Nov. 25, 1952. Since 1974, it has been performed at St. Martin’s Theatre (West St., Cambridge Cross, London, WC2H 9NZ, U.K.).

It plays 7:30 p.m. Monday-Saturday plus 3 p.m. Tuesday and 4 p.m. Saturday. Tickets cost from £16.60 (near $26) for Upper Circle 3rd to £63.10 ($99) for Stalls Premium. Go to the box office, phone 08444 99 1515 or visit www.the-mousetrap.co.uk.

What is now the European Union’s tallest building, London’s 95-story Shard — with offices, a hotel, apartments and restaurants — opened its viewing deck to the public on Feb. 1.

The main viewing gallery, on the 69th floor, is 800 feet up, more than twice as high as any other London viewing point. The 360-degree view is up to 40 miles on a clear day. Digital telescopes with touch screens allow zooming in on points of interest, with text descriptions displayed.

The Shard (Joiner...

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Fifty miles from San José, Costa Rica, is the Butterfly & Frog Garden, a 2,150-square-foot, open-air garden in the 12,000-acre park Rain Forest Adventures Costa Rica Atlantic (office at SW Third Ave., Ste. 200, Miami, FL 33129; 866/759-8726 or 305/704-3350).

Visitors will find blue morpho butterflies and blue jeans frogs, red-eyed frogs and black-and-green frogs. A bilingual naturalist answers questions. Garden entry costs $10.

Entrance to the park, itself, is free....

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As of November 2012, legally binding weddings may be conducted aboard ships of Royal Caribbean International (866/562-7625) registered in the Bahamas. Among many wedding packages is “Romance at Sea,” from $3,995, with a marriage by the ship’s captain or first officer on deck or in the ship’s chapel, and flowers, a cake, champagne, photography and more.

In Switzerland, the Espace Horloger - Vallée de Joux, or Joux Valley Museum of Watchmaking (Grand-Rue 2, 1347 Le Sentier, Switzerland; phone +41 21 845 75 45), reopened in May 2012 after an 8-month renovation.

The museum, an hour’s drive or a 90-minute train ride from Geneva, showcases timepieces from the 16th to 19th centuries and ranging from table and travel clocks to Gothic and planetary clocks. Interactive exhibits show the skills involved in watchmaking.

The museum is...

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Demonstrating life in Brugge (Bruges) in 1435, the Historium Brugge (Markt 1, 8000 Brugge, Belgium; phone +32 [0] 50 270311) provides a combination of sets, film, special effects and scents in seven rooms.

Open daily (except Jan. 1 & Dec. 25) 10 a.m.-6 p.m. (tickets till 5) and Thursday until 9. Adult €11 (near $14.50), child (under 15) €5.50 or Family Pass €30.