AP - A Taos museum is about to open an exhibit by an abstract painter who was a quiet fixture of the local community but who was well-known in the art world for her seemingly simple and muted grid paintings.

AP - A scandal over the fortune of reclusive mining heiress Huguette Clark has renewed interest in the life of her father, copper magnate William A. Clark, once one of the nation's richest men.

AP - A window of time just opened in Yosemite National Park when nature photographers wait, as if for an eclipse, until the moment when the sun and earth align to create a fleeting phenomenon.

AP - Unwinding with bar girls at a beach town came first. Building bombs was allegedly for later.

AP - The tourists in their rental cars creep down the Everglades byway known as Loop Road. Some are searching for alligators, exotic birds or maybe a ghost orchid. But others, tipped off by a guidebook or Internet post, are looking for a colorful, ramshackle spot called Lucky's Place. And when they find the old metal Lucky Strike cigarette sign and grave marker by the side of the road, they hit the brakes and head in.

AP - From around 1910 to the late 1920s, the silent film industry dominated Los Angeles.

AP - "Brazil is not for beginners," the late, great Brazilian composer Tom Jobim once quipped. Nowhere does the remark hold more true than for the country's pulsing, chaotic oceanfront metropolis, Rio de Janeiro.

AP - Major league baseball teams started coming to Florida for spring training almost a century ago, traveling by rail from the often still-frozen North to get in shape and play some exhibition games in the sun.

AP - A new exhibit about the 1980s is opening at Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art, featuring interpretations of icons like Ronald Reagan, Andy Warhol and Jesse Jackson, along with pieces that reflect on important issues from the decade: drug use, nuclear proliferation, AIDS and feminism.

AP - Located between Jerusalem and Jericho, the Judean Desert provided an inspiration to thousands of hermits who lived here in the early Middle Ages. With its breathtaking, rugged beauty, it was the perfect setting for those searching spiritual fullness in the emptiness of the desert.

AP - A new generation of parades is hitting the streets of New Orleans for Mardi Gras, and they're throwing away old traditions of big, glitzy floats and celebrity kings and queens for smaller, greener and sometimes naughtier floats with a hipster sensibility.

AP - You're not much of a skier, and jouncing through the woods on a roaring snowmobile isn't your idea of fun either. Is there any other reason to take a winter trip to Michigan's cold, snowy Upper Peninsula?

AP - It's a matter of perspective. From aboard a 12-deck cruise liner, the sight of St. Mark's Square, the Doge's Palace and Bridge of Sighs gliding past from a cabin balcony is a breathtaking thrill.

AP - There's a hidden corner of the City by the Bay where rusted cranes used to build WWII battleships loom over dilapidated artist studios, where working-class fishermen bob up against first-class ocean liners docked for repair.

AP - Indianapolis' chowder and fried clams didn't measure up to the storied fare that has spoiled John and Cheryl Younghans in their native New England. Fellow New England Patriots fan Bob Ritchie drove to the Hoosier State from Massachusetts and when he arrived was floored by the flatness.

AP - A new exhibition set to open at Atlanta's High Museum of Art showcases the work of Bill Traylor, who was born into slavery in Alabama and became a highly respected self-taught artist after he began drawing while sitting on the sidewalks of Montgomery as an old man.

AP - I'm at the wheel of a Buick Park Avenue, driving about 30 mph on a snowy surface, when a sharp curve looms ahead. I tap the brake and steer leftward entering the turn. But something goes wrong. The car skids to the right and — WHOMP — slams into a snowbank, where it's stuck fast. Auugghh!!

AP - The latest scavenger hunt takes you underwater.