Legoland’s water park to open Saturday

Legoland Florida's water park, with another 2 million Lego bricks' worth of decor, will open Saturday for its second season.

Chip Litherland / Legoland Florida

Miami Herald Staff

Legoland Florida’s water park will open for its second season on Saturday, the park in Winter Haven announced on Thursday.

The old Splash Island water park at Cypress Gardens, renovated and redecorated with Lego themes before it opened last May, got more décor and statuary over the winter — and another 2 million Lego bricks.

The biggest additions are a shark, made of almost 250,000 bricks, in the wave pool, and Moby Dick, a whale made of more than 200,000 Duplo bricks, along the Build-A-Raft lazy river. There’s also a new 15-foot water-spouting mermaid.

The water park has a wave pool, water slides, the Joker Soaker interactive play area, another play area just for toddlers and other Lego-themed features. Like the rest of the park, it is aimed at children ages 2 to 12. Unlike the main park, it is not open year-round. Information: www.legoland.com.

Read more Just In! | Travel News stories from the Miami Herald

American Queen Steamboat Co.

River cruise line adds a second vessel to sail Pacific Northwest

The American Queen Steamboat Co., which launched steamboat cruises on the Mississippi River last spring, has bought a second riverboat that will sail the rivers of the Pacific Northwest starting in April 2014. The company, named for its Mississippi River paddle wheeler, announced Tuesday it had purchased the former Empress of the North and will rename it the American Empress.
Gear + Gadgets

Got your backpack

Always improving its lines of luggage for the adventurous, Eagle Creek has fine-tuned its new Afar Backpack to be all business and a pleasure. About the dimensions of a standard wheel-aboard bag (12.5 inches by 20.5 inches by 8.5 inches deep), the Afar weighs in at a mere 1 pound, 11 ounces. It is equipped with a slew of great features: well-padded contoured shoulder straps, a tuck away padded hip belt, adjustable sternum straps, external compression straps and a sturdy top grab handle. A padded breathable mesh back panel makes for comfy cushioning. The back panel cleverly incorporates a zippered padded compartment for a laptop (up to 17 inches) that doesn’t broadcast your precious cargo to would-be thieves. The spacious main zippered compartment is blessedly unstructured, three roomy external mesh pouches are great for jackets, water bottles, snacks and maps, and a very well-designed zippered front organizer pocket has pouches and elastic slots for a cell phone, camera, sunglasses, pens and other essentials. Double-lock zippers, hidden slip pockets for documents, and reflective accents for nighttime visibility are smart security elements. Available in a dreamy slate blue, sunny ochre and basic black.
Viking Cruises

Company known for river trips announces ocean ship

Viking Cruises, a company known for offering river cruises, on Friday announced that it was launching a new cruise line for ocean-going trips.

Get the 5-Minute Herald
VIA EMAIL

Get the Miami Herald's Travel offers
VIA EMAIL

Join the
Discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere on the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

The Miami Herald uses Facebook's commenting system. You need to log in with a Facebook account in order to comment. If you have questions about commenting with your Facebook account, click here.

Have a news tip? You can send it anonymously. Click here to send us your tip - or - consider joining the Public Insight Network and become a source for The Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald.