Museum

In Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, in Spain's Canary Islands, the Poema del Mar aquarium (Sanapú Dock, Las Palmas; phone +34 928 010 350, www.poema-del-mar.com/index.php/en) opened in January 2018.

Its centerpiece is a tank with the world's largest curved window — 118 feet wide, 24 feet tall and more than a foot thick. The tank contains nearly 1,500,000 gallons of seawater and 3,000 specimens of 40 different species, such as rays and rarely exhibited bull sharks and sand tiger sharks.

Exhibiting glass art by contemporary Czech artists, Museum Port heimka (Štefánikova 68/12, Smíchov, Prague 5; phone +420 776 036 111, www.museumportheimka.cz/introduction), housed in a Baroque-era summer palace in Prague, Czechia, opened in June 2018. Six themed galleries hold the permanent collection. Temporary exhibits are also held.

10 a.m-6 p.m., Tues.-Sun. CZK120 (near $5), adult, or CZK60, senior.

Exhibiting artifacts from throughout the history of the St. Albans, England, area, the St. Albans Museum & Gallery (Market Place, St. Peter's St., St. Albans; phone +44 1727 864 511, stalbansmuseums.org.uk) opened on June 8 in a Georgian-era former courthouse that features a restored courtroom and prison cells.

The museum's galleries include objects from the Roman era, when the city was called Verulamium, to the War of the Roses on up to the Industrial Revolution. There are also galleries for temporary exhibits.

Displaying more than 5,000 artifacts from throughout the long history of Nîmes, France, mostly from the Roman period beginning in 28 BC, the Museé de la Romanité (Boulevard de Arénes; phone +33 4 48 21 02 20, museedelaromanite.fr/en/home) opened on June 2 across the street from Arènes de Nîmes, the ancient Roman coliseum.

Among the displays is a large mosaic, unearthed during the museum's construction, depicting the Theban king Pentheus being murdered by his mother.

Open daily at 10 a.m.; closing varies from 6 to 8 p.m., seasonally. €8 (near $9).

Closed for repairs and reconstruction since July 2011, the main building of Prague's National Museum (Václavské námeˇstí 68, Praha) is scheduled to partially reopen on Oct. 28, 2018, which marks two anniversaries: 200 years since the museum first opened (in another building) and the 100th anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia.

On the peak of Gaislachkogl Mountain, at an altitude of 10,000 feet in the Austrian Alps, a new James Bond museum, 007 Elements (Sölden, Austria; 007elements.soelden.com/home-en), opened in July 2018.

The futuristic building and its Ice Q restaurant (the film's "Hoffner Klinik") were filming locations in the 2015 Bond movie "Spectre." There is a screening room plus nine galleries, each with a different Bond theme, such as gadgets, vehicles or villains.

On my seventh trip to Paris with friends in April 2018, I realized that I seldom ventured outside the central core of the city, always sticking close to the Seine. In fact, I can recall only one time, on my last trip to Paris, 10 years ago, when I made a worthwhile journey to Père-Lachaise Cemetery in the 20th Arrondissement, aided by the self-tour itinerary in Rick Steves’ Paris guidebook.

City layout

Paris is divided into 20 districts, or arrondissements, numbered in a clockwise spiral. Most visitors are familiar with the 1st through 7th arrondissements. The first four, on the Right Bank, encompass the Marais, Centre Pompidou and the Louvre, while the next three, on the Left Bank, include the Latin Quarter and the Eiffel Tower.

To help wean myself from the central neighborhoods, I convinced my travel companions to take an apartment on Rue du Caire, on the outskirts of the 2nd Arrondissement, the wholesale clothing center of Paris. A 15-minute walk from the Seine, this area had few tourists wandering around, but within blocks was the very lively Rue Montorgueil and Faubourg St. Denis. (Streets beginning with Faubourg indicate that they were outside the 14th-century walls of Paris.)

At the corner of Rue St. Denis and Boulevard St. Denis, one block from our apartment, sat a triumphal arch, marking the spot of the 14th-century entry through that part of the city wall.

On the other side of the gate was the entrance to the 10th Arrondissement, whose personality changes by the hour. I excitedly returned from my first trip up the street to tell my roommates that Nigeria could be found just a block away, but by the time we made our way there a few hours later, it had turned into hipster Paris, and the French Africans had gone home or moved on to other streets. (A warning to the timid — the last few blocks of Rue St. Denis, before the Boulevard, feature older streetwalkers at almost all times of day.)

In Tokyo, Japan, the Metro & Grutto Pass includes two unlimited-ride, 24-hour Metro tickets along with free or discounted admission to 92 museums in and around the city. 

The 2018 version of the pass can be purchased at the Metro pass office at any Tokyo Metro station — except at Nakano, Nishi-funabashi and Shibuya (Fukutoshin Line) stations — until March 31, 2019. ¥2,870 (near $26). For more info plus a downloadable PDF of the museums where the pass is valid, visit www.rekibun.or.jp/en/grutto.

At the Faraday Museum (www.rigb.org/visit-us/faraday-museum), in the Royal Institute of Great Britain (21 Albemarle St., London; phone +44 20 7409 2992), visitors can see physicist Michael Faraday’s 19th-century magnetic laboratory and artifacts dating back to the institute’s founding in 1799, including antique electrical and communication equipment and personal mementos from 14 Nobel Prize winners who worked at the institute.