Travelers who purchase full-price adult tickets to any of the three SeaWorld parks can get tickets for children ages 3 to 12 for $5 each. All proceeds from AAA SeaWorld Cares child ticket sales benefit the SeaWorld and Busch Gardens Conservation Fund, which works to preserve wildlife through four focus areas: species research, habitat protection, conservation education and animal rescue and rehabilitation. Since its launch, the fund has granted $5 million to more than 350 projects in 60 countries.

The offer, for U.S. residents only, is not valid at the gate and is limited to one $5 ticket per adult ticket purchase. SeaWorld Cares tickets are available at selected AAA offices and AAA.com/SeaWorld through Dec. 31.

Navy Pier would be my choice to while away a lazy Chicago summer day. Trouble is, I paid a visit on a decidedly chilly late April afternoon. But although my timing was off, the pier is poised—once the weather warms up—to assume its role as the city’s No. 1 outdoor family-friendly entertainment destination. 

The day started out brisk and sunny, but by noon the sky had started to cloud over. By the time I headed up Michigan Avenue and then took the short jog over to the pier, the sun had vanished and low clouds ... Read More

Question: Megan asks, Do you have any tips for visiting and staying near Hersheypark in Pennsylvania?

Answer: Matt Lyle, AAA account manager, has been visiting Hershey for 13 years and says:
• When you get to town, roll down your windows… the town smells like chocolate.... Read More

A week at a Disney resort is a week away from the ordinary, even if it is ‘part of the job.’ In this three-part series, blogger Tony Mayer, a travel counselor for AAA Washington, shares the knowledge gained after a familiarization trip to Disney World in Florida.

The second park I visited was Disney's Hollywood Studios, a slice of Tinseltown transplanted to the East Coast that opened in 1989 and was known as ... Read More

AAA is now selling vacation packages to Universal Orlando® for travel beginning May 28 to include the new Wizarding World of Harry Potter area in the Islands of Adventure theme park scheduled to open this spring. The 4-night AAA Universal Vacations package starts from $285 per adult for off-site accommodations and $645 for the on-site Four Diamond hotels.

The package includes hotel, a 3-day base ticket to both Universal Orlando theme parks – one theme park/per day, early park admission to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, one breakfast at the Three... Read More

One of Golden Gate Park’s best-known attractions, the Conservatory of Flowers opened to the public way back in 1879. Plant person that I am, I simply cannot pass up a nursery, a garden or a conservatory; heck, I can’t even go to Home Depot to buy light bulbs without also stopping at the garden center and checking out every houseplant in sight. I’d been to this conservatory once before but that was back in the ’90s, so I definitely wanted to visit again—which I did, on a delightfully sunny Sunday morning.

There... Read More

I’d heard great things about Atlanta’s Georgia Aquarium. I recently visited the new, improved California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco and was extremely impressed by that facility’s Steinhart Aquarium. I also can be totally captivated by a handful of neon tetras and zebra danios darting around a 20-gallon fish tank decorated with plastic plants and a castle perched on top of a rock, so there’s something particularly mesmerizing about viewing huge-by-comparison ocean dwellers in a reasonable approximation of their natural environment from mere feet away.

All I really need to tell you about this... Read More

 
It’s almost a law that if you visit St. Louis, you go to the Arch (or to be more official, “The Gateway Arch”). National Park monument, unmistakable city landmark and indelible symbolic icon, it’s a necessary sightseeing pilgrimage.

I made the pilgrimage on a steamy, hazy August Friday morning. The Arch stands overlooking the Mississippi River on the leafy grounds of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial park. In downtown St. Louis the... Read More