Learning About Art and Ancient Sites in Mexico

Learn about pre-Columbian and Latin American art on a tour (Aug. 15 to 20) of Mexico City. Local guides will take guests on walking tours to the Zocalo, Mexico City’s main square, to visit the murals of Diego Rivera and the Plaza of the Three Cultures. Travelers will ride to Teotihuacan and visit the archeological museum at the site. Guests will also visit the pyramid at Cuicuilco and take a boat ride at the Aztec Floating Gardens at Xochimilco. Art instructor Mary Drobny will accompany the tour and will show guests through the Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera museums.

Cost: $1,359 per person, double occupancy, including air fare from Los Angeles, hotel, most meals, entrance fees, tickets for a Ballet Folklorico performance and ground transportation.

Contact: Academic Exchanges; telephone (888) 433-3055.

Borneo: Culture

An exploration of Dayak tribes and culture in the Malaysian and Indonesian parts of Borneo will be the emphasis of a two-week trip departing July 30. The trip will include Camp Leakey in central Kalimantan, with time set aside to play with, feed and work with young orangutans.

Cost: $2,699 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air on Singapore Airlines to Kuching, deluxe hotels and basic jungle lodges, all sightseeing and flights within Borneo, a Lemanak River safari, the Mulu Caves and a visit to Dayak villages and schools, where participants will distribute school supplies. The trip will end in Bali for those who want to extend the trip there.

Contact: Escapes Unlimited, 17842 Irvine Blvd., Suite 232, Tustin, CA 92780; tel. (800) 243-7227.

Bhutan: Festival

Participants in Valet Travels’ 16-day tour will be among the small number of tourists allowed to visit Bhutan this year. Departing from Los Angeles Sept. 17, the tour takes travelers to Bhutan via Bangkok and Katmandu, Nepal. The trip is scheduled around the Thimphu Festival, an annual celebration with masked dances believed to have originated in paradise and to have been handed down to saints in the 13th century. The itinerary includes visits to the Punakha Valley, with its subtropical climate, and the Jakar Valley.

Cost: $4,195 per person, double occupancy, including air fare from Los Angeles, accommodations and meals. For those with more time, there is a 10-day extension to Nepal, with a three-day stay at Tiger Tops in Chitwan National Park and a seven-day extension to Tibet, stopping at the Potala Palace, several monasteries and the little-visited cities of Gyantse and Shigatse.

Contact: Camille Carroll at Valet Travel; tel. (800) 506-1292.

Nepal: Gay Travel

Footprints, a tour operator specializing in exotic adventures for gay and lesbian travelers, is featuring two departures of its 14-day Nepal Adventure on Oct. 7 and Nov. 1.

The trip begins in Katmandu, with a walking tour to carved temples and bustling markets. Leaving the capital behind, tour members visit the Terai, Nepal’s lowland rain forest belt, during a three-day stay in Chitwan National Park. From a comfortable lodge within the park, participants enjoy a safari by elephant-back to view rhinoceros, crocodiles, monkeys and deer living in the wild. Led by local naturalists, a journey by dugout canoe highlights the park’s bird life, including kingfishers.

The next four days are spent in the low-altitude foothills of western Nepal to see mountain scenery and rural Nepali villages. After relaxing on the shores of Lake Phewa near the town of Pokhara, the tour concludes with a flight over the spine of the Himalayas.

Cost: $2,495 per person, including accommodations, most meals, all internal transportation and guides. International air fare is extra. Group size is limited to 15 participants.

Contact: Footprints; tel. (888) 962-6211, Internet https://www.footprintstravel.com.

New Mexico: Santa Fe

Each year in late August, Santa Fe’s Plaza comes alive with a vibrant tableau of Native American art. American Indians from throughout the country gather to show and sell their crafts: jewelry, pottery, weaving, sculptures, kachina dolls and photography. A tour to the Indian Market is planned for Aug. 20 to 26. Guests will also attend a performance of the opera “Carmen,” visit Puye Cliffs and spend two days in Jemez Springs, where they will explore the area’s back country.

Four nights are spent at the El Farolito B&B; and Casa Pueblos Inn in Santa Fe, and two nights at the Riverdancer Inn on the Jemez River. Near the lodging are natural hot springs.

Cost: $850 per person, double occupancy, including hotels, two meals daily and entrance fees. Transportation to New Mexico is extra.

Contact: Aventura Artistica; tel. (800) 808-7352.

Turkey: Pilgrimage

A pilgrimage in the footsteps of St. Paul and his disciples in western Turkey and the islands of Samos and Patmos is available from Sept. 26 to Oct. 10.

Sites to be visited include the city of Istanbul to see the Topkapi Palace and the Blue Mosque. Also planned are a cruise on the Bosporus, a ferry trip to Bandirma and a drive to Canakkale along the Straits of the Dardanelles. Guests will continue through the ancient cities of Troy, Akahisar, Asclepion, Pergamum, Izmir and Ephesus.

The group will travel to Antalya and stay at a resort on the Turkish Riviera before continuing on to Konya and Cappadocia, where two nights are spent.

Cost: $2,340 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air fare from Los Angeles, hotels, two meals daily, guides, ground transportation and most entrance fees.

Contact: Larry Bishop, pilgrimage director; tel. (949) 581-9936.

France: Writing Seminar

Writers can enhance their creative skills on a trip to France Sept. 1 to 12. Members will explore both urban and rural settings with poet-novelist-teacher Terry Wolverton, who will conduct daily writing workshops.

The trip begins with four days in Paris. Highlights include a visit to Victor Hugo’s quirky apartment on the Place des Vosges, writers’ haunts on the Left Bank and a canal cruise through the heart of the Bastille district to Parc de la Villette.

Then it’s off to tiny Montolieu, which lies in the Languedoc region between the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean. Here the group will be hosted for six days by the International Inkwell Hotel for Writers. In addition to daily writing workshops and critique sessions, guests will have opportunities to swim in the two rivers bordering the town, ride horses, shop in antique bookstores on cobblestone streets and take a day trip to the seaside town of Collioure, where Matisse and Picasso painted.

Cost: $3,150 per person, double occupancy, including air fare from LAX, intra-France flights, airport transfers, welcome reception at a bistro, writing classes, accommodations, all breakfasts, six dinners and a Paris city tour. Tour is limited to 14 participants.

Contact: Anne Block of Take My Mother Please Tours, P.O. Box 35219, Los Angeles, CA 90035; tel. (323) 737-2200.

Asia: Southeast

Spend 17 days seeing the treasures of Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and Singapore on a journey that leaves Sept. 12. Guests will visit the night zoo in Singapore, explore the Cu Chi Tunnels in Vietnam, see the Pak-Ou caves and the Loang Stupa in Laos, and Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom in Cambodia.

Cost: $4,550 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air fare from Los Angeles, internal flights, two meals daily, motor coach and entrance fees.

Contact: Eve Field at Sunflower Travel; tel. (949) 720-0449.

The Times is not responsible for changes in prices, dates or itineraries. These should be confirmed with travel agents or tour operators.