Florida

Parks planning special events

Here are a few updates on what’s coming at Florida’s theme parks:

• The 17th annual Epcot International Food & Wine Festival opens Sept. 28 and runs through Nov. 12. At 46 days, it’s the longest ever. Reservations open Aug. 14 for special events like Party for the Senses, Food & Wine Pairings, Signature Dinners and the popular 3-D Dessert Discovery.

New this year are two additions to the World Showcase: vegan and Florida marketplaces, tasting tours led by festival chefs, and entertaining seminars led by HGTV hosts. Eat to the Beat! concerts return, with performers including Smash Mouth, Javier Colon (winner of The Voice), Blues Traveler, Night Ranger and The Pointer Sisters.

• At Universal Orlando, Alice Cooper will create a haunted attraction for Halloween Horror Nights. What Universal calls Alice Cooper’s version of a demented and dark subconscious come to life in the haunted maze, “Alice Cooper: Welcome to My Nightmare.” The maze will put guests inside the haunted dreams of “Steven,” a recurring character on Cooper’s first solo album.

Halloween Horror Nights open Sept. 21.

(A previous version of this article incorrectly said Universal Orlando would have a second Alice Cooper house. That haunted house will only be at Universal Studios in Los Angeles.)

Air travel

Looks like fares

may be coming down

Air travelers, rejoice: Relief from soaring airfares may be just around the corner, at least temporarily.

For travelers, it can’t happen soon enough. In the first three months of the year, the average domestic airfare in the United States climbed to $373, up 4.8 percent from the same period last year, according to the U.S. Transportation Department.

That was on top of an 8.3 percent increase in fares in 2011 and another 8.3 percent increase in 2010, according to statistics from the agency.

But air travelers should get a break next month, when airfares are expected to drop 10 percent to 20 percent, says Rick Seaney, chief executive of travel website FareCompare. The price drop should affect flights starting around Aug. 21, with the start of the slow fall travel season.

New service

Swiss International Airlines said it will add four flights per week to its current daily schedule between Miami and Zurich beginning Nov. 29. The additional flights will operate through May 5.

Miami Herald

wire service