Salzburg Is Alive With the Sounds of Music

The University of Redlands Salzburg Summer Festival Tour will offer 15 days in Europe featuring music and travel framed by informal lectures on both Austrian culture and the music that will be heard at concerts. Professors Peter Madler in Austria and James Keays from the University of Redlands School of Music will accompany the tour, which departs July 24 and returns Aug. 9.

The first week will include a sightseeing program in southern Germany and the Austrian Tirol. Days will be spent visiting Munich, medieval Oberammergau, the island city of Lindau and King Ludwig’s Neuschwanstein castle in Germany; and Bregenz, Innsbruck and the Austrian Alps. During the first week, the group will see the Bregenz Festival’s staging of Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess.”

The second week will be spent entirely in Salzburg during the Salzburg Summer Festival. The group will reside at the Hotel Gablerbrau in the inner medieval section of the city, with walking access to concert halls, churches, parks, gardens, shopping areas and the Salzach River promenade.

In Salzburg the schedule will include opera productions, chamber music at the Mozarteum, an orchestra concert with the Vienna Philharmonic and preconcert lectures.

Cost: $3,495 per person, double occupancy, including ground transportation, hotels, two meals per day, concert tickets and entrance fees. Air fare is extra.

Contact: James Keays, University of Redlands School of Music: telephone (909) 793-2121, Ext. 3275.

African Roots

Spector Travel of Boston is hosting a Roots and Culture tour of Gambia Feb. 1 to 8.

Participants will take a half-day city tour of Banjul, including the health center and a nursery and primary school, where the group will present clothing, medical and school supplies. Guests will also attend an African naming ceremony, a performance of Gambian dance and music and have a chance to purchase tribal art under the guidance of an archeologist.

Cost: $999 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air fare from New York, hotel accommodations, daily breakfasts, transfers, hotel tax and service charges.

Contact: Spector Travel of Boston, 31 St. James Ave., Boston, MA 02116; tel. (617) 338-0111 or (800) TRY AFRICA.

China’s Minorities

Visit and photograph minority peoples of Southwest China with travel photographer Michele Burgess, April 11 to May 3. This tour, which focuses on the traditional lifestyles of the Sani, Dai, Akha, Miao, Bai and other minorities of Yunnan and Guizhou provinces, includes many village visits.

Other highlights are the pinnacles of the Stone Forest near Kunming, the ancient walled city of Dali, and 2,000-year-old city of Lijiang, situated at the foot of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain.

Cost: $3,950 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air from Los Angeles, accommodations, most meals, special banquets and entertainment.

Contact: In Focus With Michele Burgess, 20741 Catamaran Lane, Huntington Beach, CA 92646; tel. (714) 536-6104.

All the Tea in India

Explore Darjeeling tea gardens in the foothills of the Himalayas and tea gardens in Assam, one of the major tea growing regions of the world, on a tour of India April 16 to May 2. Participants will taste tea brewed from the tender new leaves of April’s “first flush” crop. Guests will watch spirited bidding at an international tea auction and learn the complexities of tasting and pricing tea. They will also take an elephant-back safari at Kaziranga National Park, a World Heritage Site and home to the endangered one-horned rhino. Also scheduled is a visit to the Taj Mahal at sunset, the pink city of Jaipur and shopping in the bazaars in Delhi.

Cost: $4,145 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air from New York, deluxe accommodations, meals and guides. An eight-day extension to South India is available.

Contact: Diana Altman, Fresh Pond Travel, Special Interest Tours; tel. (800) 645-0001.

Deli-Style Delhi

Depart Los Angeles April 15 for a three-week tour that visits India, Greece, Egypt, Jordan and Israel. The tour starts in New Delhi with a two-night stay to visit New Delhi and Old Delhi, then on to Agra, India, for a one-night stay to visit the Taj Mahal. Next the group flies to Bombay to start a 17-day cruise aboard the Marco Polo. The cruise takes the group to Salalah in Oman, across the Gulf of Aden to Djibouti, into the Red Sea to Luxor in Egypt, then Aqaba and Petra in Jordan and through the Suez Canal to Cairo. The next stop is Israel for a visit to Jerusalem, then across the Mediterranean Sea to the final destination, Athens, for a two-night stay before the flight home May 9.

Cost: from $4,895 for cruise, hotels, most meals and sightseeing. Not included: port charges ($295), air taxes ($42) and air fare.

Contact: Whittier Elks Travel Club, Bill Wallis, 13620 E. Whittier Blvd., Whittier, CA 90605; tel. (562) 696-7117.

Photos in Costa Rica

Visit a mountain cloud forest, where mists enshroud a lush community of more than 2,000 plant species, as well as golden toads, two-toed sloths, howler monkeys and the sacred quetzal. Participants will see where orchids, bromeliads and hummingbirds live near the edge of a smoldering volcano.

Landscape and fine-art photographer Eddie Soloway will lead this nine-day photo tour of Costa Rica Jan. 30 to Feb. 8. He will give the group evening presentations on photography and meet one-on-one with each participant.

A highlight of the trip is four nights in Costa Rica’s Corcovado National Park. Guests stay in a lodge that is perched 500 feet above the Pacific and will have access to eight unique habitats, ranging from tropical forests to unspoiled beaches. This park is a refuge for the jaguar, toucan, tamandua anteater and macaw.

Cost: $2,195 per person, double occupancy, including hotels, tuition, all meals and ground transportation. Air fare is extra.

Contact: Santa Fe Workshops, P.O. Box 9916, Santa Fe, NM 87504; tel. (505) 983-1400.

St. Paddy’s Ireland

A trip to Ireland for St. Patrick’s Day is being offered by CIE Tours International. The Irish Heritage tour runs March 11 to 18.

In Dublin for the annual national holiday, the itinerary also takes in the scenery of the Clare coast and the Cliffs of Moher, the Shannon River estuary, Killarney and the Ring of Kerry, as well as the cities of Cork, Waterford and Kilkenny.

Activities include kissing the Blarney Stone; a literary tour of Dublin; a horse-drawn carriage ride around Killarney’s Lakes; a visit to an Irish farmhouse for tea and scones by a fireside; guided walking tour of Waterford city; and admission to Bunratty Folk Park, Cobh Heritage Centre, Muckross House, Waterford Crystal Factory, Kilkenny Castle, Dublin Castle and the Book of Kells at Trinity College.

Cost: $1,328 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air fare from New York, hotel accommodations for six nights, full Irish breakfasts, five dinners (including a medieval banquet at a 15th century Irish castle), fully escorted sightseeing program, all baggage handling, taxes and hotel service charges.

Contact: CIE Tours International; tel. (800) CIE-TOUR.

Classical France

A fund-raising tour in France to benefit the Young Musicians Foundation of Beverly Hills has been arranged for classical music and art lovers. The group will fly from Los Angeles on March 24 for a 14-day holiday that includes Nice, the French Riviera, Provence, Lyons, Paris and a four-day cruise on the Rhone River.

The riverboat will sail from Martigues to Avignon, through the Camargue and Baux, Provence. A chartered bus will take participants to Grenoble and Lyons. The last three nights of the tour will be spent in Paris. Special concerts and art museum tours are planned.

Cost: $2,696 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip air fare from Los Angeles via Air France, all hotels with buffet breakfast, transportation. Contact: Connie Swanson Travel; tel. (800) 767-1977.

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