TRAVEL LOG

New digs for ants ‘Revealed’

Ants have invaded the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. Fortunately, they’re safely behind glass.

“Ants: Hidden Worlds Revealed” is the academy’s first big exhibit at its temporary quarters downtown, where it moved earlier this month from Golden Gate Park. The museum will remain at 875 Howard St. until a new facility, replacing its 1916-vintage building that was damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, opens in four years.

About a million “meat-eating, voracious” army ants from Trinidad plus thousands more specimens of other species were imported for the show, said museum spokeswoman Bethany Morookian.

In a kind of reality TV, insect style, visitors can watch ant colonies build nests, forage for food and otherwise go about their daily lives.

Because the museum’s temporary facility is smaller than its former Golden Gate home, many of its 18 million items are in storage. But about 5,400 live animals, including snakes, frogs, turtles and Methuselah, a 65-year-old lungfish, will move in over the next few weeks, Morookian said.

The museum is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. Admission is $7 for adults, $4.50 for ages 12 to 17, $2 for ages 4 to 11. (415) 321-8000, www.calacademy.org.

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Room rates

soar on

Vegas Strip

Rooms on the Las Vegas Strip are getting more expensive. Rates shot up faster in the last two months than at any other time since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks discouraged travel, according to surveys by Fulcrum Global Partners, an independent research company based in New York.

The average Strip room rate, in bookings for stays April 1 through May 29, was $219, compared with $146 for the same period last year, the survey showed. Both convention and vacation travel to Vegas have increased, Fulcrum associate analyst Dan Foley said, pushing occupancies up to 99% at some hotels.

Strip rates were still less than at many resorts elsewhere, he said. To save, he added, don’t gamble on the rates: “Book early. If you wait until the last minute, you’re going to get dinged.”

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US Airways

tries to keep

it simple

US Airways is the latest airline to simplify its fare structure, following similar moves by America West and Alaska Airlines.

The airline last month debuted a program called GoFares for flights to and from Philadelphia, where it is going head to head against low-cost Southwest Airlines. The program applies to L.A.-to-Philadelphia flights starting July 6; start dates vary by city.

Under the program, walk-up fares are capped at $499 each way, and there are no requirements for Saturday night stays or round-trip purchases to get low fares. That compares with L.A.-to-Philadelphia walk-up fares that were recently up to $1,349 each way. Under the new fare structure, advance-purchase fares between the two cities are as low as $89 each way.

US Airways spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said Philadelphia is the “first wave” of GoFares, but she declined to say when the program might expand.

In another move, the airline last week joined the Star Alliance, which groups more than a dozen foreign and domestic carriers. Passengers get access to airport clubs, frequent-flier miles and other benefits shared among member airlines. For details on the benefits, visit www.staralliance.com.

-- Compiled by

Jane Engle