Florida: Norton art museum hosts exhibit of LEGO structures

At Legoland parks, builders construct entire city skylines of LEGO bricks. In Palm Beach, the Norton Museum of Art saw art in the structures and commissioned Dan Parker, a LEGO-certified professional, to use the bricks to construct landmark buildings from around the world. The structures are part of the exhibit Block by Block: Inventing Amazing Architecture, which opens Thursday and runs through Oct. 20.

Florida State Parks cabins

Lodgings that take you back to nature

Central Florida is famous for a lot of features, but your first association probably isn’t “cabins in the woods.”
Central Florida: theme park round-up

New this year in Orlando are penguins, Krusty Burgers, Autobots and Decepticons, Chima animal warriors and a home for the Disney princesses
Attractions

Some water parks are only natural — or sometimes not

When it’s cold, they’re warm. When it’s warm, they’re cold.
Florida: Lakeridge Winery hosts 23rd annual Harvest Festival

Do the stomp
Florida: SummerJazz on the Gulf in Naples

Lawn party
Bed check: Jacksonville Beach

The Casa Marina inn, awash in history

The Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Presidents Harry S Truman and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Jean Harlow, Charlie Chaplin and Al Capone. Cheryl and Matthew. These are some of the distinguished guests who may have graced Casa Marina with their presence, and probably tracked in some Jacksonville Beach sand, too.
Florida

Change comes to Ocala’s Silver Springs

I’m pretty sure I just made my first trip to Silver Springs, the old-school tourist attraction in Ocala.
Florida: Kissimmee’s Old Town hosts Car Cruise

All revved up
Orlando

Not just Simpson family but now all of Springfield coming to Universal Studios

Five years afte r the dizzying Simpsons Ride debuted at Universal Studios in Orlando, the theme park is expanding the presence of the dysfunctional television family and its hometown of Springfield.
Orlando theme parks

SeaWorld introduces Antarctica: Empire of the Penguin

SeaWorld Orlando’s new Empire of the Penguin, which has its grand opening Friday, is a fun family ride that tilts and twirls gently through an artist’s impressionistic re-creation of Antarctica and ends up in an icy penguin habitat where a visitor could easily watch the antics of the real thing for hours -- if only it weren’t a bone-chilling 30 degrees.
Florida: Key West Pride June 5-9

A proud tradition
Gulf Coast

On the hunt for the teeth of giant prehistoric sharks

Paul Reinckens kicked slowly over the sandy bottom 30 feet deep in the Gulf of Mexico looking for triangular objects — not an easy task with visibility a mere four feet and this dive being his first underwater fossil hunt. But suddenly, there it was: a hard, brownish-gray chevron lying on the sand.
Central Florida

New Legoland ride to open July 3

Legoland’s new attraction, The World of Chima, in which animal tribes war over an energy source called Chi, will open July 3, the park announced Tuesday.
Travelwise

Check out Miami’s new hotel scene

Miami-Dade — South Beach especially — is still seeing a surge of new or rebuilt hotel openings, giving locals plenty of fresh options close to home.
Fun on a budget

Miami: 5 free things to do on a staycation

With its sizzling beaches and steamy nightlife, it’s no wonder Miami is a top vacation spot for snowbirds, spring breakers, international tourists and passengers heading out on cruises from Florida ports. More than 13 million people visited the city in 2011, according to the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau.
STAYCATION ISSUE

Far out trips close to home

A week’s worth of South Florida fun
Past the velvet ropes

A midsummer night’s clubs

It’s a Friday or Saturday night and you are ready to go out and get your party on. You know Miami and South Beach are among the best places in the world to do this, but since you don’t normally frequent the clubs and you’re not interested in spending a ton of cash on bottle service, you end up staying home and jamming out to your favorite Pandora station. Well that’s no fun!
Florida: Kissimmee Blue Skies & Silver Spurs Festival

Ups and downs
Bike trails

Exploring Miami-Dade on two wheels

Growing up in Miami, riding a bike was my primary source of true neighborhood exploration. I spent countless hours outside discovering surroundings: which trees to climb, where the best parks were, finding hidden roads. It was a new adventure every day.
Wizarding World of Harry Potter

‘Diagon Alley’ to open at Universal Studios in 2014

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Orlando will expand into London next year, the theme park announced Wednesday. The new area, which has been under construction for months, will be built along Diagon Alley, and the centerpiece will be a ride based on Gringotts Bank. It is to be completed in 2014.
Theme parks

New attractions star Transformers, penguins, animal warriors

Central Florida’s theme parks will have a spate of new attractions opening over the next three months as Autobots take on Decepticons, the animal tribes of Chima battle over “chi,” pirates battle over treasure, penguins open their 30-degree home to visitors (Brrr!), space shuttle Atlantis goes on display, and the characters of Madagascar come to life.
Florida: Disney to open 24 hours on May 24

Just can’t get enough
Theme parks

Transformers ride to open at Universal in June

Transformers: The Ride – 3D will open at Universal Studios June 20, just a year after construction began and close to the start of the summer season, resort officials announced Thursday.
Florida

Vero Beach: Off the well-trodden tourist trail

You can order Gloria Estefan’s ropa vieja at either end of an hour-and-a-half drive on I-95, but only in Vero Beach does it come with a side dish of an uncrowded, white sand beach.
Florida: Collier celebrating 90th anniversary

Historic moments
Florida: Eight Flags Shrimp Festival on Amelia Island

Come hungry
Florida museum

A new perspective on art, history and technology

Those who remember the pink stucco and brick façade of the original Elliott Museum will be surprised at the “pink lady” now. The Grand Dame has been reincarnated. The demolition and reconstruction took 1 1/2 years.
Florida: Key West Songwriters Festival May 1-5

They write the songs
Make it a weekend garden party

During the 1950s, my husband traveled from New York to Miami Beach for winter vacation long before there was an I-95. He recalls seeing the McKee Jungle Garden, hailed as a “mecca for visitors,” set along Route 1 in Vero Beach. Attractions at the 80-acre “manmade jungle” included a wide variety of palms, spider and rhesus monkeys, a bear named Dr. Dolittle and fly-eating flowers.