Travel Briefs

The town of Moneygall in County Offaly, Ireland, has commemorated its distinction of being the home of President Barack Obama’s maternal great-great-great-grandfather, Falmouth Kearny, with the Barack Obama Plaza (Junction 23 M7, Moneygall, Co. Offaly, E53 F342, Ireland; phone +353 505 45810, barackobamaplaza.ie). 

The anchor of the modest plaza is the President Barack Obama Visitor Centre, with an exhibit on Irish culture and on the Irish roots of several American...

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The International Symposium on Birding & Aviation Conservation, organized by Holbrook Travel (Gainesville, FL; 800/451-7111, www.holbrooktravel.com), is taking place Jan. 5-7, 2017, at the Selva Verde Lodge & Rainforest Reserve (www.selvaverde.com), located in Sarapiquí, Costa Rica.

The symposium will include daily lectures on birding and conservation and three excursions to nature reserves for hands-on birding. Symposium attendance is available only through Holbrook Travel...

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A new, eye-catching, glass-facade concert hall, built on the Norderelbe River atop the 120-foot-tall, brick Kaispeicher — once the largest warehouse in Hamburg — is scheduled to open Jan. 11, 2017. 

The Elbphilharmonie (Platz der Deutschen Einheit 1, 20457, Hamburg, Germany; phone +49 40 357 666 66, www.elbphilharmonie.de/en) houses two concert venues, a hotel, apartments and a restaurant. The lower Kaispeicher section, now containing parking, is also topped with a...

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In southeastern London, after more than 20 years of restoration work, a beautiful example of industrial architecture opened to visitors as a museum in April 2016. Originally built in 1865, the Crossness Pumping Station (The Old Works, Thames Water S.T.W., Bazalgette Way, Abbey Wood, London, SE2 9AQ, U.K.; phone +44 208 311 3711, www.crossness.org.uk) pumped sewage out of the city and into the Thames estuary until 1956.

The interior consists of repainted floral ironwork and decorative...

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Travelers with a stopover at Munich Airport in Germany can use the online “Stopover Guide.” Visit www.munich-airport.com/stopoverguide, input the date of your arrival and the flight numbers of your incoming and outgoing flights, and you’ll get a list of activities and sites of interest that can be experienced around Terminal 2 within your stopover’s time limit.

 

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A 2016 map of Prague, Czechia (aka Czech Republic), is available free for download by visiting www.praguecitytourism.cz/en/media/-maps-and-brochures and clicking on “Prague – City Map.” It also is free at visitors’ centers in the city.

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Guests at Anan­tara Angkor Resort (National Road no. 6, Khum Svay Dangkom, Siem Reap, Cambodia; phone +855 63 966 788, angkor.anantara.com) can book a guided dawn tour of Angkor Wat Archaeological Park followed by breakfast at a secluded temple. Guests are then free to explore the complex, with its ninth- to 15th-century temples, the rest of the day.

The “Breakfast at Angkor” excursion costs $135 for two people and can only be booked at the hotel after check-in. The...

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Near the first capital of the Yuan Dynasty, in the province of Inner Mongolia, northern China, selections of more than 60,000 Mongolian artifacts are on display in the Xanadu Museum, which opened on May 1. The 6,991-square-meter site includes eight buildings, with display descriptions in Mongolian, Chinese and English. Entry is free. 

The museum is about four miles from the ruins of the city of Xanadu (Shangdu), a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Originally built in 1256, the city and...

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