Busch Gardens

Private-equity firms don't have a good track record for improving the properties they buy. They're better known for buying firms, improving efficiencies (sometimes to the company's detriment), milking them for cash, and then flipping them when they can profit. Recently I wrote the sad but familiar...

Shamu, the first female orca ever captured, has been dead for 38 years. Isn't it time the world's most famous performing killer whale got her own wax figure? With private-equity firm Blackstone Group, which owns Madame Tussauds wax museums, reportedly in talks to buy SeaWorld and Busch Gardens...

This week, Disney announced that it's expanding its theme park empire yet again. Just as it did in Hong Kong, the company is going into business with an Asian government (China's) to construct yet another theme park, this time in Shanghai. If everything goes according to plan, Disney will open its...

It's the death knell for yet another lovely American tradition: Free beer for visitors to Anheuser-Busch's theme parks. SeaWorld's three locations and Busch Gardens' two locations are capping the keg on the generosity.The free cup of beer was one of the coolest things about any theme park in...

Gas prices continue to set records, making potential vacation expenses seem so great, I almost have to forgo all hopes of a summer vacation. On top of that, foreign currencies continue to make a killing against the dollar. Who wants to pay $6 for a Parisian croissant? Not me. But you don't have to...