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On Ohio's Lake Erie Wine Trail: Firelands Winery

Everybody knows the Wine Trails of Napa/Sonoma, Argentina, the Loire Valley and, more recently, NY's Hudson Valley, but this week it's all about Ohio. Yes, Ohio has wineries—lots of 'em actually—and we'll be sharing our favorites with you.

Today: Firelands Winery and Vineyard in Sandusky, Ohio

Drive to Cedar Point Amusement Park BUT, just before you take the exit to the Roller Coast Capital of the World, make a turn onto tiny Bardshar Road and into the driveway of Firelands Winery. Originally named Mantey vineyards, the winery has been around since 1880 and growing all their grapes either right there...in the vineyard next to the parking lot or, for the majority, on the tiny North Bass Island just a ferry ride away.

To see the historic winery, you're free to wander around on a self-guided FREE tour. There's the tanks, the bottling room and the temperature-controlled warehouse. If you'd like to stay for a little longer, you can hit up the wine dispensers for a pour and pop a squat in their very nice bar area, complete with chandeliers made of wine bottles.

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Perhaps You've Seen This Island from a Plane. Well, It's For Sale.

You ever been flying over a body of water and looked out the window to spy an island that, from 30,000-ish feet, seems like the best place in the entire world? Perhaps you even say to yourself, "man, that's the island I'd buy if I had a million dollars."

Now, usually islands cost more than a million, not counting all the extra it'd take to build a home and a pool and manage the upkeep, but there's one that actually comes in right under budget...and we happened to have flown over it just yesterday.

Be sure to snag a window seat on the left side of the plane if you're flying Philadelphia to Detroit, and look down about 15 minutes prior to arrival. There's a high likelihood you'll spy the Lake Erie Islands, a grouping of odd pieces of land that you'd never expect somewhere like Ohio to have. South Bass Island is the gem, which spends its summer fostering a Mardi Gras-like atmosphere with rowdy bars and much dock-side drinking in its town of Put-in-Bay. Keep watching....past South Bass is the beach-ringed Middle Sister Island. AND IT'S FOR SALE.

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Drive the New 'Shawshank Trail' in Mansfield, Ohio

Mansfield, Ohio, the town where the 1994 cult classic The Shawshank Redemption was filmed, is still hoping to cash in on the 15 minutes of fame it experienced nearly 20 years ago.

Mansfield has recently developed The Shawshank Trail, a "drive-it-yourself" tour of the sites used in the movie, like the "Shawshank Oak Tree", the woodshop where the prisoners worked, the county courthouse, and the stretch of road where Red rode the bus after being released from prison.

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A Leaked Memo Reveals Cedar Point's Mega Coaster Plans for 2013

The 2012 roller coaster and theme park season is just getting underway, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t too early to start thinking about what’s arriving in 2013. Over at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio, park officials are trying to ensure that the park maintains its reputation as the top coaster park in the world, so that’s why they’ve already allocated around $25 million towards a brand new roller coaster.

An official announcement hasn’t been made yet, but it sounds like the project has been code named “CP Alt.Winged.” The new roller coaster will be touch all the superlatives necessary to make it big news: fastest, longest, with one of the highest drops. This is all being reported thanks to a leaked corporate memo from the park’s CEO. All the funds aren’t just going towards the new ride, as it appears that the park will be reworking their entrance as well as moving and removing some existing stuff to make room for the arrival of a fresh ride.

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Foreign Grocery Friday: Ohio's Peanut Buttery Buckeyes

When we travel, one of our favorite things to do is to pop into a local grocery store and check out the food products and candies we'd never find anywhere else. So we're trying out this new feature, Foreign Grocery Friday, where each week we'll feature some of our (and your) favorite overseas treats. Got a recommendation? Let us know!

Buying off-brand Peanut Butter Cups is risky. Oftentimes they just aren't as yummy as Reese's and, even worse, they could come in a holiday tin with a Currier & Ives scene printed on the top. Yuck. That's why it's high time to share a secret indulgence of our own which can only be gotten in parts of Ohio.

The peanut butter and chocolate treats are Buckeyes, shaped like the actual nuts they're named for, but tasting so much better. Their existence is a school- and state-spirit thing, and you'll find them in Columbus to honor OSU, and Toledo, because that's nearest where they're made (in Perrysburg, Ohio). Both cities are usually passed through on road trips, but we advocate taking an hour to detour and find Buckeyes.

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Run with the Pigs at Next Month's Marathon in Cincinnati

If you missed the Boston Marathon earlier this week—don’t worry—there’s still plenty of marathons where you can risk injury to gain access to a gold medal. The Boston Marathon doesn’t really have a theme or anything clever going for it, so that’s why we’re glad we skipped it to focus on the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon.

The main even takes places on Sunday, May 1 where runners from across the nation and the globe will make their way through the city and to the Finish Swine—their words not ours—as quickly as possible. We’re not experts when it comes to road races, but this has got to be one of the few marathons that actually takes runners across a state line—here they even run into Kentucky.

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Firsthand Body Scan: A Best-Case Scenario

Backscatter scanners at Pittsburgh Airport

The issue of whether or not to going along with full-body scanning at airport remains a hot one. Earlier this week, one of Jaunted's special operatives found himself facing a scanner at Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky Airport. He chose the pat-down and this is his story:

I made it to the shitty Terminal 2 [at CVG] with plenty of time before my flight. There was no line at security, but I did notice the TSA people were using the type of body scanner that looks like two monoliths on either side [ed. note: this is the Backscatter ray scanner]. It also seemed as if they had standard security open with the metal detector, but when i was about to put my belt and things down for their scan, a TSA lady was like "body scanner!" and i said, "I would like to opt out, please." And she said, "okay, hold on."

Even if I was in hurry, I still wasn't interested in getting drilled with not entirely tested radiation. So I waited there and after two minutes, they said that their only male groping artist was busy just then. Okay, so they didn't use those exact words to describe him, but he was busy—patting down an elderly man on a scooter.

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How to See the Cincinnati Zoo's New Baby Giraffe

You might not think of Cincinnati as a hotbed of animal and botanical conservation, but it turns out that the city has one of the best zoo and conservation programs in America. Though the park is relatively small, it's the second-oldest zoo in the country and its Reptile House is the single oldest zoo building in the United States. That plus a bunch of other stuff was enough to earn it a National Historic Landmark designation, and today the grounds are a mix of old buildings and heavily renovated modern displays.

There are over 500 species spread across the park, and the zoo's breeding program focuses heavily on larger mammals like cheetahs, tigers, rhinos, and gorillas. The big news this week, though, is that their giraffe Tessa gave birth to the park's first baby giraffe in 26 years.

We obviously recommend flying in for the weekend to see the still unnamed little girl—viewing details are here—but in the meantime there are photos aplenty plus the video of the birth we've embedded at the bottom (the video starts off kind of messy so this is your official content warning).

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'The Avengers' Will Come Together in Cleveland

Usually we think of superhero movies as taking place in big cities, vast deserts, or some other exotic locale, but that won't be the case with The Avengers.

Yesterday, Ohio's governor John Kasich announced that The Avengers will be filmed in Cleveland next month, at least in part. The movie was originally set to be shot in New Mexico, New York, (where they still spend some time shooting) and Michigan, but after losing Michigan's tax incentives they were on the hunt for a replacement location, and Cleveland was more than happy to step up to the plate.

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George Clooney Returns to His Cincinnati Roots for 'Ides Of March'

George Clooney may have spent New Year's on a beach in Cabo, but he'll soon be turning in the sunshine of Mexico for the Midwestern snow and cold.

Clooney is set to begin shooting Ides of March in his hometown of Cincinnati and northern Kentucky next month. George is a graduate of Augusta, Kentucky High School, which is about an hour outside of Cincinnati. His dad Nick, who still lives in the area, also worked at several Cincinnati television stations throughout the 1960s and 70s and has written columns for the local newspaper too.

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Why Does Toledo Express Airport Need a Full-Body Scanner?

Yesterday, it was announced that the latest airport to receive a Full-Body Scanner was Toledo Express Airport, in Toledo, Ohio. Our first thought: "umm, why?" Toledo Express isn't exactly known for being a high-traffic airport with a variety of passengers passing through; in fact, it's barely known at all, seeing as how it serves a whopping average of five flights a day to such exotic locales as Chicago and Minneapolis, and—if they're lucky—Detroit, only 45 minutes north by car.

Now we're not blindly hating on TOL; we've got family in the area and we've flown into and out of this airport more times than we care to admit. It's just that Toledo Express Airport has no reason to have a full-body scanner, other than the vague cry of "terrorism." All the potential knife-wielding gang members flying out already hustle up to Detroit to catch flights anyway. Toledo can't even call itself "Toledo International" because it only offers regional flights. But wait, now let's talk about the current security at TOL and why it's enough...

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The TSA Caught Don King with Ammunition in Luggage at Cleveland Airport

Chalk one up for the TSA today as they've gone and actually caught something dangerous in someone's luggage. That something was ammunition and that someone was promoter Don King, who was attempting to fly out of Cleveland's Hopkins Airport several hours ago, while packing heat for both .38 caliber and .357-caliber firearms, while the actual guns were not present.

Although it sounds like King stopped by Cleveland for a little "shopping," he was actually in town for the funeral of his wife, who recently died due to complications from stomach cancer. It's been a sad week for Don King, and even more so now that the TSA took all his ammunition. He was, however, allowed to continue with his flight to Florida once they'd taken all of the dangerous items from his luggage. Go here to see a short video report on the incident, from the AP.

[Photo: BBC/Getty]