Prost! Munich toasts 200 years of Oktoberfest (AP)

MUNICH – It’s a wedding party that got out of control: Two hundred years ago, Bavaria’s Crown Prince Ludwig celebrated his royal nuptials with a big public bash that was such a hit it became an annual event — and came to be known worldwide as “The Oktoberfest.”

His bride, Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghusen, gave her name to the Theresienwiese festival grounds upon which the event welcomes more than 6 million people a year for towering mugs of beer, oompah music and bright traditional costumes.

“I was made for this festival. I love it,” crowed Meagan Aylward from Charlotte, North Carolina, while holding a mug of frothy Oktoberfest beer.

The “Wiesn” — as Oktoberfest is locally known — was put on hold for various reasons during its 200-year history, including the two World Wars, the Franco-Prussian war, and cholera epidemics. That makes this year the 177th edition.

“The Wiesn has been part of my life ever since I started thinking,” said Friedrich Steinberg, whose family has operated one of the tents on the 77-acre (31-hectare) festival grounds in the center of Munich for 31 years.

“When we started having this tent, it was nowhere near so crowded, there were no days when you were forced to close the entrance” said the 40-year-old, who normally runs a downtown restaurant. Today, it’s not uncommon for the tent to fill up shortly after it opens at 9 a.m., he said.

Oktoberfest usually runs 16 days, but this year’s festival started Saturday and will run through Oct. 4 — a day longer than usual after the Munich city council made an exception for the 200th anniversary.

The city also set up a special area with an exhibition of Oktoberfest history — replete with period costumes — as well as a beer tent serving a special brew, the “Jubilee Beer,” for which Munich’s six normally competing breweries joined forces in a historic beer truce.

While the core of the Oktoberfest remains the same, with Dirndl-clad waitresses delivering 2-pint (1-liter) mugs of beer, its flavor has evolved over the years. A local festival with small beer gardens has mushroomed into a massive international event featuring about a dozen cavernous beer tents, some seating more than 10,000 singing, inebriated revelers at a time.

“Back in the old days, there were perhaps 200,000 or 300,000 people coming to the Oktoberfest, which then already was a record,” said 67-year-old Peter Hartmann, who hasn’t missed an Oktoberfest in 55 years.

“Now if you go out there at night, you can’t choose your path freely anymore; you’re pushed by the crowd in a certain direction,” he complained.

But Martin Wimmer, who has been a regular visitor for 38 years, likes the change.

“Now there are more young visitors, in the tents you also have modern music and the atmosphere has become even more relaxed,” said the 62-year-old from nearby Rosenheim.

Wimmer, wearing traditional Bavarian Lederhosen leather shorts, said he makes sure to visit Oktoberfest at least eight to 10 times per year: “This year maybe even 12 times.”

On any given festival day he’ll drink up to eight mugs of beer.

That, however, is but a tiny drop of the 1.6 million gallons (6 million liters) of beer that visitors down during the festival every year. They also consume some 500,000 chickens, 100 oxen and an unknown number of large doughy pretzels at the festival.

The festival’s malty pale beer is made exclusively by Munich’s breweries, and comes in 1-liter steins called “Mass,” costing some euro9 ($12).

People crowd the huge shared tables in the tents and the outdoor beer gardens seeking the festival’s famous “Gemuetlichkeit” — a word capturing Bavaria’s special coziness and fondness for savoring the moment.

“Oktoberfest is the best place to be because it’s one of the places that brings all the nations together,” said 25-year-old Israeli ballet dancer Ilia Sarkisov. “They drink, have no war, have only peace. And that’s what’s it’s all about.”

However, Oktoberfest has been targeted with violence in the past — a bomb attack in 1980 attributed to the far right killed 13 people and injured 200 others. Last year, it was mentioned in a threatening message released by the Taliban, and security officials remain on alert.

This anniversary Oktoberfest has had a perfect start so far, with more than 1 million visitors over the weekend and pleasant fall weather.

Smoking has been banned inside the tents for the first time, but no major problems with the new regulation have been reported.

Waitress Hermine Roth was marking another anniversary — the 20th year she has been lugging beer steins, 10 at a time, to her customers’ tables.

Despite the physical demands, the 64-year-old said she can’t imagine not being part of it all.

“It really becomes an addiction,” she said. “When it’s over, you’re already looking forward to the next Wiesn.”

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Prost! Munich toasts 200 years of Oktoberfest (AP)

Monet show to reconcile French with snubbed master (AP)

PARIS – Beloved by Americans, Impressionist master Claude Monet has long been a victim of a sort of Gallic snobbishness in his native France.

A new exhibition at Paris’ Galleries Nationales attempts to right this historic wrong by bringing together nearly 200 pieces by the painter — from blockbuster chefs d’oeuvre reproduced in books, magazines and postcards worldwide to little-known, privately held pieces you’d never guess were Monets.

Curator Guy Cogeval said “Claude Monet (1840-1926)” — the most complete Monet exhibit in France since 1980, with paintings on loan from dozens of museums and collections from Cleveland, Ohio, to Canberra, Australia — is a bid to “repatriate one of the great geniuses of French art.”

“We (the French) have always said, ‘Monet’s for an exhibit in Japan, an exhibit in the United States, but not for one in France.’ But why? He’s one of our greatest painters,” Cogeval told The Associated Press.

He chalked this reticence up to “snobbishness,” saying the French largely dismissed Impressionism as “something for tourists” and preferred other 19th century movements like Realism or Symbolism.

This Gallic apathy “has had disastrous consequences” on the French public’s appreciation of Monet, Cogeval said, adding that the lion’s share of recent scholarship on the painter was done by academics in the U.S. and Britain.

“I think the French public will be very surprised” by the show, said Cogeval — who also heads Paris’ Musee d’Orsay, a museum dedicated largely to the Impressionists.

Organized thematically, the exhibition — which opens Wednesday and runs through Jan. 24 — showcases the subjects that obsessed Monet throughout his long life, from the rocky coastline of Normandy to the haystacks and poplars he revisited under every conceivable meteorological condition, to the Japanese bridge and water lily-filled pond at his home in Giverny.

It highlights his evolution from a gifted but slightly conventional landscape painter — churning out in the mid-1860s seascapes so realistic they could almost be mistaken for photographs — to a painter whose feathery brushstrokes that captured shifting light, atmosphere and movement helped launch the Impressionist movement.

Grays, slate blues and forest greens dominate the early work, but Monet’s palette slowly broadens out, first to include pastels like buttery yellows and salmon pinks and then to the bold mauves, teals and crimsons of his final years, when his eyesight was clouded by cataracts.

“Point de la Heve at Low Tide,” an 1865 depiction of a foreboding, rocky beach in the northwestern Normandy region where he grew up — one of Monet’s early critical successes — shows his lifelong preoccupation with weather and atmosphere: The skies churn with foreboding black clouds and the whitecap-dotted sea roils.

Even as a young man of 25, Monet had already begun his lifelong pattern of returning over and over to the same subjects. The first paintings in the show, both from 1865, are two different takes on the same subject, a clearing in the forest of Fontainebleau, outside of Paris.

That kind repetition runs through the show, as its five curators scoured private museums and collections in at least 14 countries to procure multiple reinterpretations of the same scenes.

A series of five paintings from 1890-91 looks at the same mammoth haystacks at different times of day and throughout the year, capturing the mushroom-shaped objects under the golden sun of a sweltering midsummer’s day or shrouded beneath a glinting covering of frost or snow.

The facade of the cathedral of Rouen appears as many times in the exhibit, its Gothic facade tinged canary yellow, mauve, apricot or dusty gray, depending on the changing light.

Still, the show manages a fine balance between such Monet hallmarks as the haystacks and the cathedral and little-known pieces painted in styles one wouldn’t normally associate with the Impressionist master.

“Hunting trophies,” a realistic 1862 still life of dead fowl, looks like it was left over from some completely unrelated exhibition.

And at first glance, “Luncheon on the Grass” — a monumental 1865 work — appears surely to have been painted by Edouard Manet, whose 1863 canvas of the same name was a critical hit at the time and has blossomed into an enduring masterpiece.

But it’s definitely a Monet: Determined to surpass Manet, the fiercely competitive Monet tried his hand at an even larger, more complicated composition of the same genre. But the project proved too ambitious for the young painter, who abandoned it and stashed it away for decades before eventually gifting it to the French government, curators said.

A 1866 portrait of his first wife, Camille, wearing what curators said was likely a rented dress of sumptuous green silk, conjures up the stately portraits of American painter John Singer Sargent.

Of course no Monet retrospective would be complete without his iconic “Water Lilies,” which have launched a thousand Impressionist calendars the world over. The monumental series of murals couldn’t be moved from the Orangerie Museum across town, but curators culled more than a dozen paintings of the aquatic plants — which Monet himself had planted in a specially dug pond in his garden in Giverny.

From the beginning of his career through the end of his life and beyond, Monet’s admirers in the U.S. were largely behind his enduring success, the curators said.

“Americans were really the people who got Monet’s career moving,” said Richard Thomson, another of the show’s curators. “By the 1880s, Monet’s paintings were selling extremely well in America … perhaps because the American taste was less rigid than in France.”

Cogeval said he expects the exhibition will attract some 700,000 visitors — many of them French people, but also many of Monet’s enduring American fans.

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Online: http://www.grandpalais.fr/en/Homepage/p-617-lg1-Homepage.htm

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Monet show to reconcile French with snubbed master (AP)

Pa. art exhibit shows war through soldiers' eyes (AP)

PHILADELPHIA – For as long as the United States has gone to war, it has sent soldiers marching off to battle armed with paintbrushes, canvas, ink and sketchbooks.

With little fanfare or public recognition, they have captured the sights, sounds and sensations of combat since the American Revolution. Examples of Army soldiers’ efforts over the past century will be on display, many for the first time, in a new exhibition in Philadelphia.

“Art of the American Soldier” opens Sept. 24 at the National Constitution Center and runs through Jan. 10. It will also travel to other as-yet-unannounced locations, Constitution Center president David Eisner said.

The museum has planned gallery talks, an audio tour that includes soldiers telling their own war stories, workshops and lesson plans to complement the exhibition. An online art gallery also encourages veterans from all branches of the military to submit their own art expressing their personal war experiences, Eisner said.

More than 250 paintings and sketches from World War I to the present provide a glimpse of the daily lives of soldiers, from the canteen to the stark, noisy and chaotic battlefield.

“The Army was truly interested in seeing war through the eyes of the soldier artists, not for propaganda purposes,” said artist and Vietnam veteran Jim Pollock, of Pierre, S.D. “We were encouraged to express our experiences in our own style; we could determine our own agenda and our own subject matter.”

Combat art programs are long-held military traditions. The Air Force, Marines and Navy have their own museums in which they display art from within their ranks. The Army, lacking such a museum, keeps its 15,000 wartime paintings and sketches made by 1,300 unsung soldier artists in storage. Many of the pieces in this exhibit have never before been on public view.

“This is the American people’s collection and we want them to see it,” said retired Army Col. Rob Dalessandro of the United States Army Center of Military History in Washington. “These paintings tell a fascinating story of the life of soldiers and the duty of soldiers.”

The scope of the Army’s art program has waxed and waned over the decades, its funding often subject to prevailing political winds and aesthetic tastes.

“The Army falls in love with photography during the Civil War and people begin to question why we need artists,” Dalessandro said. “Thankfully during World War I, there’s the realization that something is captured on canvas that cannot ever be captured on film.”

Funding was yanked in the middle of World War II, as the program’s $125,000 price tag within a $72 million 1942 war budget was deemed excessive by critics. Then-U.S. Rep. Joe Starnes, an Alabama Democrat, notoriously called the program “a piece of foolishness.”

Some civilian artists continued working, however, with financial backing from LIFE magazine and others. Federal funding was restored a year later, and 23 soldiers and 19 civilians returned to their duty.

“By the end of World War II, more than 2,000 pieces of art are produced and there are many prominent artists in the program,” Dalessandro said, among them Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Bill Mauldin and proto-Pop painter Wayne Thiebaud.

The Korean War had no Army art program. During the Vietnam War, more than three dozen soldiers were tasked with making sketches and photographs to translate onto canvas later. Most recently, Army artists have been witness to military operations in Somalia, Haiti, Panama, the Balkans, and the Persian Gulf and Iraq wars.

Pollock, 22 years old and just out of art school, spent August to December of 1967 in Vietnam. Armed with India ink, a sketch pad and a gun, Pollock visited 52 units and covered 3,600 miles.

“When I got there, what I expected to see isn’t what I saw,” he said. “I didn’t see glorious battles or anything like that. I saw body bags stuffed in a Huey helicopter, I saw death and destruction.”

Pollock has several pieces in the exhibit from his Vietnam service. Among them is “Looking Down the Trail,” a watercolor of a soldier viewed from above amid a claustrophobic tangle of foliage.

“When we were in the field, the heat was so oppressive the only breeze would be from the bugs flying around,” he said. “What I tried to do was focus on the individual soldiers, to get past what you can see visually and get to the deeper emotional experience of this hostile environment.”

Unlike the older, more seasoned artists who documented both World Wars for the Army, Vietnam’s relatively inexperienced soldier artists often brought a raw aesthetic to their work.

“When the war was over, I went on to other subjects and never returned to it,” said Pollock, now a painter focusing on landscapes and abstract works. “Looking back, I’m amazed at what I did do at my age and inexperience.”

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Online:

National Constitution Center: http://constitutioncenter.org

Jim Pollock: http://pie.midco.net/vietwarart/vietart1.html

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Pa. art exhibit shows war through soldiers’ eyes (AP)

Old San Juan as a destination, not just side trip (AP)

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – Old San Juan echoes with centuries of history, dating back to the island’s discovery by Christopher Columbus in 1493 and the massive 16th-century Spanish forts overlooking the sea.

Today the neighborhood’s cobblestone streets pulsate with salsa music and beckon guests with a walkable, chaotic montage of restaurants, shops and clubs amid the Old World architecture. A visit to Old San Juan can be more than just an afternoon’s diversion; it’s worth considering this extraordinary enclave as a base for your vacation, and as an alternative to a beach resort.

You can walk from one end of Old San Juan to the other in about 15 minutes, passing buildings in every pastel hue imaginable. Make your way to Calle Tetuan and you’ll see a house reputed to be among the world’s narrowest at about 5 feet wide. Vines with neon-tinged blooms climb over balconies; trees explode in brilliant colors, and from some spots, you can see the turquoise sea.

Accommodations are plentiful and some hotels, including the renowned El Convento, are historic and unmistakably Spanish in style and ambiance. The El Convento site housed a Carmelite convent in the 17th century; it opened as a hotel in 1962, hosting celebrities like Rita Hayworth. At night in the Moorish-inspired courtyards, you’ll hear the famous coqui, a native frog whose big whistle contrasts to its tiny body. The sound is two syllables, in a delightful echo of its name. On Sundays, you’ll see weddings across the street at the historic San Juan Cathedral. In peak winter season, nightly rates at El Convento run $280-$400 (cheaper in the fall). Less expensive lodging options include Hotel Milano and Casa Blanca Hotel ($100-$200 nightly in winter).

Start your day in Old San Juan with a stroll early in the morning and have breakfast at the hip Aromas high-tech coffee bar, or Manolin, which has been around for over 60 years and has a retro vibe. Manolin has tables in the back and speckled green counters up front with green vinyl swivel stools. Servers sport crisp white shirts monogrammed with “Manolin Old San Juan” and dark trousers. A full breakfast costs less than $4. Another option is to walk over to the main square, the Plaza de Armas, and have a cafe con leche (coffee with steamed milk) and a mallorca, a sweet roll with powdered sugar. Don’t miss the ubiquitous Puerto Rican pastry known as quesito, a tube-shaped puff pastry filled with sweet cheese.

The area has a wide array of restaurants but it can be challenging to find one that serves more than mediocre tourist fare. Try Toro Salao, 367 Calle Tetuan, a Spanish-Puerto Rican fusion restaurant with (rare) outdoor seating on a plaza at the southern edge of the old city. Melao is somewhat out of the way along the waterfront near the southern entrance to the old city, Calle del Muelle 100, but is also very good and has outdoor seating. Verde Mesa, 216 Calle Tetuan, a tiny vegetarian restaurant, only serves lunch but is known for fantastic fruit shakes — no small feat in a place where shakes, known as batidas, are a staple. The French restaurant Trois Cent Onze (its French name translates to the numbers in its address, 311 Calle Fortaleza), is expensive but good.

After 10 p.m., the clubs begin to swing. Some places offer an hour’s free lesson before the dance floor opens to the general public. The Latin Roots at the port has a live band that plays Latin standards, along with some of the newer salsa hits. The Nuyorican Cafe in the heart of Old San Juan has jazz or fusion earlier in the evening, then switches to salsa. Other clubs offer rock and flamenco.

Although Puerto Rico’s reputation for crime is not undeserved, with more than 890 people killed last year in the island’s third-worst year for homicides, the tourist thoroughfares of Old San Juan feel relatively safe. Police are stationed on nearly every corner around the clock. Still, the community has been hit hard by the recession and many businesses are shuttered. You will see “se vende,” for sale, on nearly every street.

As a U.S. commonwealth, Puerto Rico is an especially easy destination for Americans to navigate. The currency is the U.S. dollar; if you are a U.S. citizen you don’t need a passport to visit, and many people speak English, though this is a great place to practice your Spanish. Be aware that the Puerto Rican accent is unusual in the Spanish-speaking world, so don’t be surprised, even if you are a Spanish speaker, if the jargon and pronunciation sound different.

Getting around is easy, too. Old San Juan has free trolleys, including a route that goes to the famous El Morro complex of forts. The monuments are operated by the U.S. National Park Service as the San Juan National Historic Site; last year they attracted over a million visitors. They also comprise a UNESCO World Heritage site, designated as a classic example of European military architecture in the New World. The fortifications were built by Spain on a strategic headland to protect the city, bay and Spanish trade routes from attack by European rivals. Exploring the buildings, ramparts and grounds, with their stairways, arches, tunnels, dungeons and spectacular views, makes a wonderful day’s outing. Kite-flying on the grounds is a popular pastime.

For faster transportation than the trolley, cabs are readily available and run on a flat rate. The cabbies provide a printed list of the fares; a ride to the beach is about $15. Or for 75 cents, take the city bus — the guagua. It could be slow-going but you’ll eventually reach your destination. There are some lovely restaurants right on the beach, including Pamela’s at the Numero Uno Guest House in Ocean Park, where you can have a wonderful ceviche with mango while watching kites flying over the palm-fringed beach and swimmers splashing in the surf. As with many other local restaurants, a 15 percent gratuity is included on the bill at Pamela’s, so check before you add a tip.

There are plenty of designer outlets in Old San Juan, including brands like Tommy Hilfiger and Ralph Lauren, but the shopping may not be much better than what you would find at your local mall; no high-end Euro imports here, though you will find local artwork in galleries.

About a 10-minute drive from Old San Juan is the Plaza del Mercado de Santurce, known as La Placita, a daytime market. Evenings, late in the week and into the weekends, when the market closes, restaurants and clubs ringing the market open for business. One of the best but a bit hard to find is Jose Enrique, about a block away from the market on Calle Duffaut in a house with no sign. Arrive early; it’s small and reservations are not accepted. Dance your dinner off back in the marketplace, where a dance floor is set up and live or recorded music blares until well into the night.

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If You Go…

PUERTO RICO: http://www.gotopuertorico.com/

SAN JUAN HISTORIC SITE (FORT COMPLEX): http://www.nps.gov/saju/ and http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/266

HOTEL EL CONVENTO: http://www.elconvento.com/

HOTEL MILANO: http://www.hotelmilanopr.com/

CASA BLANCA HOTEL: http://www.hotelcasablancapr.com/

THE LATIN ROOTS: http://www.thelatinroots.com/

PAMELA’S RESTAURANT: http://www.numero1guesthouse.com/pamelas.html

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Old San Juan as a destination, not just side trip (AP)

New exhibit peels back layers of O'Keeffe (AP)

SANTA FE, N.M. – Beneath layers of paint, wrapped in bundles of brushes, hidden in sketch books and packed away among boxes of paints and pencils are clues that shed light on how Georgia O’Keeffe went about creating her colorful landscapes and iconic flower paintings.

Like forensic investigators, curators at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe have spent months combing through their collection and now they’re ready to share the many bits of evidence they have collected as part of the exhibition “O’Keeffiana: Art and Art Materials,” which opens Friday and runs through next May.

The collection of O’Keeffe’s never-before-displayed art materials, preparatory drawings, Polaroids and a pair of unfinished paintings is designed to give visitors a better understanding of how the late American modernist transferred her ideas about the world around her onto canvas.

“We have a kaleidoscope of material — from the art to the materials she used to make it and the houses that she lived in — and it’s the first time we’ve been able to draw on them to clarify in people’s minds what her objectives were as a painter and how she used materials to create things,” said museum curator Barbara Buhler Lynes.

The O’Keeffe Museum has a wealth of materials from the artist’s estate. At the time of her death in 1986, O’Keeffe’s two homes in northern New Mexico and most everything in them were set aside for preservation. That included her brushes, paint chips with notes jotted on the back, sketch books, canvases and hundreds of rocks and bleached animal bones she gathered over decades of exploring the high desert.

It was the job of associate curator Carolyn Kastner to search the museum’s climate-controlled vaults for clues that would help explain the foundation of O’Keeffe’s very deliberate style.

“I opened all the closets and pulled out all of the drawers. It’s been fascinating,” Kastner said.

Aside from the drawings O’Keeffe had organized in file folders by name, Kastner came across books filled with photographs O’Keeffe had taken of the same subjects from the same vantage points, just in different light and shadow. There was an album of cottonwood trees where O’Keeffe was clearly studying their texture and another of an area near her home in Abiquiu that she called the Black Place.

A series of her Polaroids is part of the show, along with the large painted canvases that were inspired by her study of the V-shapes in Glen Canyon.

“By putting these things together — the drawings, the photographs, the bones, the stones — we can recreate a kind of look at her practice. We can’t see her practice, but we can see the evidence from one object to another,” Kastner said.

Aside from revealing details about how she worked, the way O’Keeffe trimmed her brushes and stored her tools and art materials also provides some insight into her personality.

Over and over, Kastner and Lynes use the words precise and meticulous.

“Hundreds of brushes shaped and reshaped,” Kastner said. “It’s all about that finish that we know so well in her paintings, getting a precise line or a precise contour to come up, feathering over to make the surface as smooth and clear as it is. It follows through to everything.”

Kastner recalls that as she was laying out the exhibition, a rigid order began to emerge from the displays of O’Keeffe’s art materials. She wanted something “messy” to break up the orderly squares so she headed downstairs to the collection room.

“There was nothing,” she said. “What I’ve learned in looking at all of these materials, and particularly her art materials, is how meticulous she was. It comes out even in the way she stored materials.”

Visitors will see several galleries that include O’Keeffe’s tools, her line sketches and her more elaborate paintings. Infrared studies of some of her canvases also help to show how her drawings provided the foundation for her works of art.

Those works, Lynes said, have a certain look about them.

“It all reflects her aesthetic: very simplified, elegant forms that relate to one another, either abstractly or realistically. She uses them when she’s painting recognizable forms and she also uses them when she’s painting abstract forms,” she said. “They always come together in similar sorts of arrangement, and because of that, you always know you’re looking at an O’Keeffe.”

The curators acknowledge that many of the works in “O’Keeffiana” would not be part of a traditional exhibition, but this show is more about discovering the painter’s process than celebrating what has become a worldwide fascination with her monumental flowers and sweeping vistas.

O’Keeffe worked differently from many other artists, Lynes said. For example, Renaissance painters would often stray from their original under drawings, repositioning elements of their paintings as they went along.

“O’Keeffe usually doesn’t do that,” she said. “It’s interesting. It tells you she knew exactly what she wanted to do.”

Part of the inspiration for the exhibition comes of another exhibit Kastner put together while working in San Francisco. That show highlighted the work of a photographer who captured artists working in their studios. He had become friends with them and often stayed long enough that they forgot that he was there.

“I thought they were beautiful photographs, but people thought they were windows into a studio. People were fascinated to see artists in their studios, and I began to realize this is a place most people don’t get to see,” Kastner said.

There are very few photographs of O’Keeffe working in her studio or out in the wilds of New Mexico. However, the museum does have images of her studio, and on the window sills were an ever-changing cast of rocks and bones she used as subjects.

“There’s a quote about her infinite interest in natural color and shape and how it represents the wideness and wonder of the world she lives in. I think she was a student of that her entire life,” Kastner said.

Both Kastner and Lynes consider the exhibition an invaluable look at the artistic practices of one of America’s most important painters — practices that were consistent throughout O’Keeffe’s career, from her early work in 1916 to her last abstractions in the late 1970s.

“We can’t conjure a whole person out of this exhibition,” Kastner said, “but we can see the trace of her action on paper and canvas.”

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New exhibit peels back layers of O’Keeffe (AP)

Exhibit shows the real George Washington (AP)

RALEIGH, N.C. – There’s the George Washington made famous in the Gilbert Stuart portrait found in many elementary schools and, in engraved fashion, on the $1-dollar bill: a severe man, whose severity is accentuated by thin, taut lips.

And then, there’s the real Washington: an entrepreneur who developed the nation’s largest distillery; a deeply religious man who wrote in a letter to a synagogue that the new country would give “to bigotry no sanction”; a slave owner who believed slavery would tear apart the country; and a dental patient whose ill-fitting, hinged dentures were most likely the cause of his stern look in the Stuart portrait.

That’s the Washington portrayed in “Discover the Real George Washington: New Views from Mount Vernon,” in an exhibit at the N.C. Museum of History. The exhibition — which continues into January 2011, then moves to seven other states before returning home to Mount Vernon in 2013 — opens with the Stuart portrait, then moves to dispel the misconceptions created by that famous painting. The exhibit started in Pittsburgh at the Heinz History Center before opening Sept. 10 in Raleigh.

“This is obviously an iconic portrait in the Mount Vernon collection but also a wonderful introduction to the exhibition because it gives you a very good idea of some of the myths that we’re trying to dispel and some of the things we’re trying to learn beyond this portrait,” said Carol Cadou, vice president of collections and senior curator at Mount Vernon.

While the only surviving complete set of Washington’s dentures is likely to draw the most attention among the 100 or objects in the exhibition, the real stars are three life-size wax figures of the first president showing him at the age of 19, when he was a surveyor; at 45 as commander in chief at Valley Forge, sitting on his blue roan horse, Blueskin; and taking the oath office at 57 on the balcony of Federal Hall.

The figures, with human hair, are based on studies by Jeffrey Schwartz, an anthropology professor at the University of Pittsburgh, who used a minimal amount of material related to Washington to help create them.

Mount Vernon declined to give Schwartz access to Washington’s skeleton so he moved to other objects: clothing (but no shoes, boots or hats); a statue, bust and life mask by Jean-Antoine Houdon; the one complete set of dentures, made not of wood but of bone, tusk and ivory; and various portraits.

Still, he’s certain that the figures represent a true view of Washington.

“I’m very confident,” he said in a phone interview. “I tried to double-check everything. I didn’t just use the statue. I didn’t just use the clothing. I didn’t just use one thing. Instead of saying, Houdon was told not to make the statue larger than life, I checked it against the clothing. I checked the face of the life mask with the bust.

“I don’t think you could get any closer even if you have Washington’s skeleton.”

Perhaps President Obama took his cue from Washington when he ordered his inaugural suit from a U.S. company — the last figure of Washington shows him wearing a plain, brown suit from cloth made at a mill in Hartford, Conn.

Under British rule, the colonies weren’t allowed to import looms. Instead, they were supposed to send all raw goods back to Britain, which would mill them and send them back to the colonies — with high prices and taxes attached.

“He certainly knew how his inauguration would be seen around the globe,” Cadou said, noting that the ambassador from the Netherlands commented on the magnitude of Washington’s suit choice.

That’s just one example of Washington’s grounded nature. Another is illustrated in the painting by John Trumbull, which shows Washington resigning his commission as commander in chief of the Continental Army to Congress assembled in Annapolis, Md. A graphic of that work is part of the exhibit.

Washington “could have been anything that he wanted to be,” Cadou said. “People were already referring to him as king, and he certainly could have been American royalty. Instead, he believed so strongly — as did the other founding fathers — in those principles of a republic and a democracy that he went to Congress, resigned his commission and did something else quite extraordinary, which was to bear his head.”

Typically, an 18th-century gentleman would not remove his hat and tip his head unless he was submitting to another person, Cadou said.

“It was a remarkable experiment that, of course, made George Washington even more famous,” she said. “But his eyes were on Mount Vernon and he wanted to return home.”

At Mount Vernon, he and Martha Washington were overwhelmed with guests. In one year, Mount Vernon hosted more than 670 overnight guests. Guests continued to visit after Washington’s two terms as president ended in 1797.

Visitors may have led to Washington’s death on Dec. 14, 1799, Cadou said. He had been riding his lands and when he returned home, guests had arrived. He didn’t change out of his wet clothes and 24 hours later, he was unable to get out of bed.

His death brought on a period of national mourning that included mock funerals in all major cities. People would ask Martha Washington for locks of hair and set his buttons in gold for ornaments.

“Washington becomes now this very revered and this very beloved hero,” Cadou said. “I think we just can’t imagine a figure that would endear this much attention, this much national sentiment.”

___

If You Go…

DISCOVER THE REAL GEORGE WASHINGTON: At the N.C. Museum of History, 5 Edenton St., Raleigh, http://ncmuseumofhistory.org/ or 919-807-7900. Monday-Saturday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sundays, noon-5 p.m. Adults, $10; ages 18 and under, free. Exhibit in Raleigh through Jan. 21. Later in 2011, opens at Minnesota History Center in St. Paul on Feb. 22, National Constitution Center in Philadelphia on July 1, and Fort Worth (Texas) Museum of Science and History on Oct. 11. In 2012, exhibit travels to Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum, Simi Valley, Calif., and the Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, Okla.; in 2013, to the Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, and to Nevada.

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Exhibit shows the real George Washington (AP)

Wineries add attractions for one-stop sipping (AP)

GEYSERVILLE, Calif. – Think a winery visit means bellying up to a bar with a couple of glasses and a spit bucket? You haven’t been to wine country lately.

These days you’re likely to find all kinds of added attractions, from restaurants to farmers’ markets to cocktail bars.

And then there’s Francis Ford Coppola’s latest venture which, once construction is complete, will include a swimming pool.

The idea is to help wineries stand out at a time when competition for shrinking tourist dollars is fierce and create something more than just another stop on the trail.

“The experience we’re trying to create is a destination experience,” says Chris Hall, proprietor and vice president of sales at Long Meadow Ranch Winery & Farmstead in the Napa Valley, which has, among other things, a working farm producing grass-fed beef and olive oil; a restaurant, Farmstead; a seasonal produce farmstand and a seedling nursery.

“You can come and eat the heirloom tomato salad at the restaurant, you can take the tomatoes home for yourself from the farmer’s market. You can get the seeds to grow your own at the nursery,” says Hall. “It’s a full circle.”

In the mood to sip and dip?

You’ll be able to soon at the Francis Ford Coppola Winery in Geyserville.

Much of the director’s movie memorabilia and awards that had been on display at his other winery, Rubicon Estate in the Napa Valley, have been moved to the new winery. Other features: a restaurant, Rustic, a full bar, a wine-tasting bar and an under-construction swimming pool that will come complete with a pool-side cafe.

Guests who want to swim will be issued towels and can also rent cabines, little huts, for changing and showering. A built-in stage will host children’s puppet shows, readings and musical performances. And if you’re still looking for something to do there are bocce courts.

“The idea is that when people come here, they are going to be coming for the day,” says Corey Beck, general manager and director of winemaking. “One of the things Francis has always thought was kind of a little bit weird was that when people decide to come to Sonoma County or Napa or wherever and they take a vacation — what do they do with the kids? This is creating an experience for the family. Children can go swimming; they can see a puppet show. Mom and Dad can roll a game of bocce, have a little bit to eat, we’re also going to have a children’s menu, and then, also, by the way, taste wine as well.”

Another winery offering a taste of something extra is Somerston, which is featuring food pairings and an art gallery at its Yountville tasting room, along with a gourmet grocery store — expected to open this fall — next door.

The grocery will be using organic produce, honey, olive oil and lamb produced from the Somerston Ranch in the eastern mountains of the Napa Valley. And you can eat on the rooftop patio of the grocery.

The idea was to provide visitors with a window to Somerston’s 1,628-acre ranch, says Craig Becker, a partner in Somerston as well as general manager and winemaker. Visitors might not have time to make it out to the ranch, but they can taste Somerston wines along with a lamb slider made from Somerston’s grass-fed herd when the grocery opens.

What if you find yourself in wine country but fancy something a little bit different?

That’s no problem at the Medlock Ames Winery in Sonoma County, where owners have a full cocktail bar next to their Jimtown tasting room, both housed in a restored bar and grocery. The bar opens when the tasting room closes, at 5 p.m., and nibbles, such as charcuterie and sometimes pizza, are available to go with the drinks.

Medlock Ames general manager Kenneth Rochford says opening the tasting room in Jimtown was partly a matter of location — the tasting room is in a well-traveled location whereas the Medlock Ames ranch is some miles away and off the beaten path. Installing a bar was partly inspired by the history of the building as well as the desire to put a twist on tradition.

“We wanted to create something we would use ourselves,” he says. Both tasting room and bar have a fresh, local food component — order a mojito and the bartender nips out to the nearby garden to pick the mint.

Rochford sees the move toward wineries aiming for destination status, and incorporating more food and other agricultural factors into their presentation, as a positive one.

“It should be about food and wine. It should be about this rich diverse agriculture we have and showing it off,” he says.

“The idea is just to show some good hospitality.”

___

If You Go…

LONG MEADOW RANCH WINERY & FARMSTEAD: 738 Main St., St. Helena, Calif., http://www.longmeadowranch.com/ or 707-963-4555. Tasting room open 11 a.m.-6 p.m. daily.

FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA WINERY: 300 Via Archimedes, Geyserville, Calif., http://www.franciscoppolawinery.com/ or 707-857-1471. Tasting room open 11 a.m.-6 p.m. daily.

SOMERSTON: 6490 Washington St., Yountville, Calif., http://somerstonwineco.com/ or 707-967-8414. Tasting room open Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-10 p.m.; Sunday-Monday, noon-8 p.m.

MEDLOCK AMES: 3487 Alexander Valley Rd., Healdsburg, Calif., http://www.medlockames.com/Winery or 707-431-8845. Tasting room open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Bar opens 5 p.m.

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Wineries add attractions for one-stop sipping (AP)

How do you predict fall foliage? With lots of eyes (AP)

WOODSTOCK, Vt. – Jon Bouton does his leaf-peeping from his car, traveling Vermont’s bumpy back roads in a 2001 Geo Prizm.

When the sugar maples, ash and poplars begin to show their colors, the Windsor County forester sends e-mails to the state tourism office, describing where the colors are brightest and what roads to drive to see them. His counterparts in Vermont’s other 13 counties do the same twice a week, their reports eventually combined into an online “foliage forecast.”

Bouton, 59, is part of a small army of foresters, park rangers, volunteers and attraction operators in foliage-rich states whose observations point the way.

“If we’re driving somewhere, we’re looking,” he said.

Fall foliage is a multimillion-dollar business for tour operators, inns, restaurants and attractions who cash in on the rush of camera-toting visitors. Nowhere is it more vibrant than in New England, where a predominance of maple trees produces a dazzling display of red, yellows, oranges and browns and everything in between.

In Vermont alone, visitors spend $374 million a year in the September-to-November season. Lucrative though it is, the fall isn’t as big for the state as ski season and summertime, tourism department spokeswoman Erica Houskeeper said.

Typically, the foliage season runs from the end of September to mid-October, when chlorophyll in the leaves breaks down because days are getting shorter and nights colder.

Forecasting the colors is not new, but the Internet has boosted its immediacy and given leaf lovers new tools for going where the color is. Visitors can get foliage forecasts from state-run telephone hotlines that advise where to go and online — in words, maps and photos.

In North Carolina, the state Division of Tourism’s “Leaf Peepers” program puts forecasts online and on a telephone hotline beginning Sunday. In Tennessee, the Great Smoky Mountains Association posts a web page the observations of a volunteer. In Pennsylvania’s Pocono Mountains, the regional visitors bureau posts color-coded maps online.

“The technology allows us to do quicker, more accurate foliage reporting, which is aboslutely essential for our fall visitors,” said Jeanne Curran, a spokewoman for Maine Department of Conservation, which relies on park rangers for leaf reports.

The forecasts come from volunteer spotters who deliver reports about what roads to drive, which kinds of trees are turning and when the peak periods of color will be. Those, in turn, are posted on websites in words, photos and colored maps.

“Best Bets: Route 108 through Smugglers’ Notch between Stowe and Cambridge is showing early color, as are Routes 242 and 100 near Jay Peak, Route 114 between Lyndonville and Canaan, and Route 2 near Danville,” read part of the forecast from Vermont’s tourism department this week.

New Hampshire, which gets observations from three dozen designated “leaf peepers” from chambers of commerce and lodging properties, offers foliage text alerts for those who want them, as does Massachusetts.

Among the eyes: “White Mountain Mike” Duprey, 58, a public relations representative and group tour coordinator for the White Mountain Attractions Association. Twice a week, he gives updates on his part of New Hampshire that are then incorporated into the state tourism department’s foliage forecast.

While it’s in his interest to report blazing colors, he says he never exaggerates.

“We really are honest, to a fault,” he said. “We’re more cautious, because we know — each one of us — that the worst thing would be to give a report that’s more optimistic and then get someone up here saying, `I read that foliage report and it wasn’t anywhere near as colorful as they said.’”

Massachusetts uses park rangers who e-mail their reports twice a week.

“It’s not based on predictions, it’s based on actual observations,” said Betsy Wall, executive director of the Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism.

Bouton, the Vermont forester, acknowledges he puts a positive spin on his reports — by not giving negative ones.

“I’m more likely to say nothing than I am give a negative report,” he said. “But if I say this road should be a good place to take a look, it would be.”

As for this year’s foliage forecast, experts say the summer’s hot, dry weather could make for more muted colors, an earlier start, both — or neither.

University of Vermont plant biologist Abby van den Berg, who has done research on leaf colors, said some data suggest a small amount of physiological stress can result in more brilliant colors.

“The real bottom line is that there’s no great way to predict these things,” she said. “It’s pretty much impossible, especially over a large scale.”

___

Online:

Maine foliage tracker: http://www.mainefoliage.com

New Hampshire foliage tracker: http://foliage.visitnh.gov

Vermont foliage forecaster: http://www.vermontvacation.com/fallfoliage2010/fallfoliage2010.asp

Massachusetts foliage: http://bit.ly/b968cV

Tennessee foliage: http://bit.ly/aec1Um

Pennsyvlania mountains: http://www.800poconos.com/visitors/fall-foliage-forecast/

North Carolina tourism: http://www.visitnc.com

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How do you predict fall foliage? With lots of eyes (AP)

Priceline introduces feature for hotel freebies (AP)

NEW YORK – What’s your must-have hotel freebie? Free breakfast? Free parking? Or maybe you’ll pass up the garage and make-your-own waffles for a room upgrade or spa credit.

Whatever you’re looking for, Priceline.com has introduced a new feature that makes it easier to find the hotel freebie of your dreams at http://www.priceline.com/freebies.

“Increasingly freebies are becoming a staple for hotels of almost any star level to differentiate themselves, especially in this economy,” said Priceline spokesman Brian Ek. “What we’re finding is that consumers are looking for freebies and they value them, in some cases as much or more than a really good rate.”

Priceline has listed hotels with freebies before, but until now, “there wasn’t a way to conveniently see who was offering what in a macro sense. You could not easily compare,” Ek said.

The new feature assembles freebies “in a searchable way, so that a visitor to the site could mine our hotel database to see what’s available.”

Most consumers will probably search by location. Type your destination into the white box next to “find my deal” on the Priceline.com/freebies page. Enter Atlanta, for example, click “free breakfast,” and 20 choices pop up with details on the offers. Click on the “see dates” feature on the right for a calendar.

You can also filter results by a particular freebie. “If you wanted to take a golf vacation, for example, you’re probably flexible in terms of where you want to go,” Ek said. Clicking on the “golf credit” box brings up hotels in Tucson, Ariz., Hawaii and Chesapeake Bay, Md., each offering free golf with a stay.

The new Priceline feature has a total of 10 freebies to choose from: free breakfast, free parking, golf credit, spa credit, room upgrade, resort credit, kids stay free, free nights, hotel extras and instant discount.

The instant discount lists additional dollars off standard rates for stays on certain dates. “You would see this elsewhere on the site, but in the freebies section, all of the hotels offering date-specific discounts are assembled for easy comparing,” Ek explained.

Hotel extras include children’s activity kits, complimentary drinks, coupons for stores, casino credits, or credits or coupons toward food.

For my family, free breakfast is the must-have in every hotel we stay in. And while it does save bucks, it’s actually more about convenience. It’s the most efficient way for us to get what we want in the morning without a lot of fuss, allowing us to quickly get out of the hotel and on our way to the day’s activities. We don’t have to waste time hunting down a restaurant in an unfamiliar city, and even the simplest lobby buffets tend to provide something for everyone. One of my kids wolfs down two bowls of cereal; the other prefers to sleep in a bit and grab a bagel to go.

For other travelers, getting a freebie can be a risk-free way to try something. Maybe you wouldn’t pay for a children’s activity kit, but if you have kids and you’re choosing between two hotels with similar rates, you might as well book the one with the kit. Or maybe you’ve never been to a spa, but a free massage might be a fun way to try one.

“It is just a really simple feature, very intuitive and it’s very easy to pick a hotel that’s going to give you not only a good deal but added value for whatever matters most to you,” said Ek.

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Priceline introduces feature for hotel freebies (AP)

Ancient temple ruins dot Cambodia's countryside (AP)

SIEM REAP, Cambodia – Tourists gather every day before dawn to watch the sun rise over Angkor Wat, a 12th-century temple and the grandest legacy of Cambodia’s once mighty Khmer empire. Even at 5 a.m., the heat and humidity is enough to make the visitors break into a sweat.

More than 1 million people come annually to see the remains of the Khmer temples that dot the sprawling Angkor region, 145 miles (230 kilometers) northwest of the country’s capital, Phnom Penh.

For Cambodians, the temples are nothing less than a symbol of their nation; an outline of Angkor Wat adorns the national flag.

A nearby temple, Wat Thmei, also includes a reminder of a dark chapter in recent Cambodian history. A memorial stupa houses bones and skulls from the victims of the “killing fields,” who were executed by the brutal Khmer Rouge regime that ruled in the late 1970s.

Today, Angkor is a vital contributor to the poor nation’s economy, with almost all visitors to the country traveling to the ruins. After a hot day visiting the temples, tourists head to the bars and Western-style air-conditioned restaurants in the nearby town of Siem Reap.

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Ancient temple ruins dot Cambodia’s countryside (AP)

Events, ideas and destinations for fall travel (AP)

NEW YORK – Autumn travel means harvest festivals, classic New England inns, and hikes and drives to see fall foliage.

But it can also mean whitewater rafting in West Virginia, birding on Lake Erie, wine at Monticello, and a concert in Indianapolis where the instruments are made from vegetables.

For day-trippers, check state tourism websites for foliage reports with dates and locations for the best leaf-peeping. To find a pick-your-own orchard near you, visit http://www.PickYourOwn.org. For pumpkin-picking, try http://www.pumpkinpatchesandmore.org. And to find a corn maze, check out http://www.cornmazesamerica.com.

Festivals are also a popular way to celebrate the season. Vermont hosts the Northeast Kingdom Fall Foliage Festival, Sept. 27-Oct. 2 in six towns over six days: Walden, Cabot, Plainfield, Peacham, Barnet and Groton; http://bit.ly/9PcTzt. In Massachusetts, the Wellfleet OysterFest runs Oct. 16-17, with arts and crafts, kids’ activities, an oyster-shucking contest, and of course, food. In Springfield, Mass., the Big E Fair, billed as New England’s largest fair, runs Sept. 17-Oct. 3, with concerts, parades, a midway and the fair’s trademark cream puffs. Keene, N.H., celebrates the 20th anniversary of its Pumpkin Festival — featuring thousands of carved and lit pumpkins — on Oct. 16, http://www.pumpkinfestival.org/.

And the fun is not limited to New England. In Versailles, Mo., the Old Tyme Apple Festival, scheduled for Oct. 2, typically attracts more than 30,000 visitors. The Apple Butter Days Fall Festival, Oct. 8-9, is held at the Camden County Museum, in Linn Creek, Mo. Also worth visiting in Central Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks region is the 95-mile Art & Ambiance Trail, with vineyards, galleries, museums, studios, shops and eateries; http://www.funlake.com.

In West Virginia, whitewater rafting season on the Upper Gauley River takes place now through Oct. 17, corresponding to water releases from the Summersville Dam. Some 60,000 people visit annually to ride the Class III to Class V-plus extreme rapids. Outfitters include Adventures on the Gorge, http://www.adventurewestvirginia.com.

For bird-lovers, a new checklist of what to look for on the freshwater shoreline of New York and Pennsylvania, also called the Great Lakes Seaway Trail, has been posted at http://www.seawaytrail.com/birding. The route is 518 miles long, from the Akwesasne Mohawk Nation on the St. Lawrence River to the Pennsylvania-Ohio border on Lake Erie, and includes the Niagara River and Lake Ontario.

A little later in the season, Indianapolis hosts “Food for Thought,” Nov. 5-14, — http://bit.ly/b2YCxP — a culinary event with more than the usual tastings and demonstrations. There will be edible artwork, seminars on raising bees and chickens, and conversations about subjects ranging from hunger to eating disorders. A Nov. 6 concert features music literally played on instruments made from vegetables, like a pepper trumpet and a leek violin; a Nov. 10 concert features kitchen implements (bring your own pots and pans and join in). An orphan’s feast on Nov. 7 features a menu of cornmeal and water as diners see a documentary and photos of African orphans celebrating their food.

Virginia is promoting scenic drives for fall, including Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park, the Blue Ridge Parkway, celebrating its 75th anniversary this year, and the heritage music trail known as the Crooked Road; http://www.virginia.org/fall/. The website for Great Smoky National Park has a special section recommending autumn drives and hiking trails at http://bit.ly/aB0ZZN.

Thomas Jefferson’s home in Charlottesville, Va., hosts its first wine festival Sept. 18, with a second event there Sept. 29 to kick off October as the state’s designated wine month; http://www.monticello.org/wine. The wine cellar at Monticello was recently restored and open for tours. Jefferson was an early advocate of American wine, and Monticello now raises grapes and bottles and sells several varieties of wine, drawing on Jefferson’s early experiments with a vineyard. Virginia’s wine industry is booming, from six wineries in 1979 to more than 160 in 2010, and wine month will feature events around the state.

For bargain-hunters, fall travel is ripe with opportunity — and not just for eating corn, apples and pumpkins. In many destinations, fall is considered the “shoulder season,” which Travelzoo senior editor Gabe Saglie described as “a transition period between high and low season, usually defined by occupancy going down and pricing going down.”

Cruises, for example, are most popular in summer when consumers have vacation time, and in winter, when travelers yearn for warmer climes. But in the fall, cruise operators offer lots of last-minute deals as they try to fill cabins, especially for cruises to the Caribbean and Mexico, where the threat of hurricanes leads to dramatic price drops both on ships and at land resorts, Saglie said.

Also popular in the fall are annual foliage cruises to New England and Canada. While some cruisers book these well in advance, Saglie says “there are always some last-minute opportunities out of New York, Boston or Canada. Flexibility is key when it comes to taking advantage of the bargains.”

And you don’t have to worry about your cruise getting caught in a storm; cruise operators are very cautious about weather in the region this time of year and change itineraries as needed.

Travelzoo.com offers links to “seasonally driven deals” but consumers looking for travel bargains might also sign up on the site for a weekly newsletter e-mailed each Wednesday highlighting the top 20 deals.

Vermont has a “Midweek Peek” promotion where dozens of inns, hotels, attractions, historic sites and museums offer specials. Details at http://www.VermontVacation.com/midweek. The Appalachian Mountain Club is also offering a deal for Sunday-Friday travelers: Stay two nights at AMC’s New England lodges and White Mountain huts and get a third night free. Details at http://bit.ly/bPGH0T.

Many hotels offer packages themed on the season. Saybrook Point Inn & Spa in Old Saybrook, Conn. — http://www.saybrook.com — offers a “Best of Autumn” package with a two-night stay, Friday and Saturday, starting at $885, including cider and cookies, breakfast both mornings, one dinner for two, tickets for a foliage cruise on the Connecticut River and a picnic lunch for the boat, with a take-home gift of produce from a local farm. The Spa at Woodstock Inn & Resort in Woodstock, Vt., just opened a new spa, with a $278-a-night package that includes accommodations for two, a $100 credit toward spa treatments and full breakfast for two, http://www.woodstockinn.com.

The New England Inns & Resorts Association, which represents nearly 250 lodges, hotels and B&Bs, lists a variety of seasonal specials at http://www.NewEnglandInnsandResorts.com. The Inn By The Sea in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, near Portland, offers a “Pumpkin Harvest on the Harbor” package, Oct. 15-31, with rates starting at $784 per couple, including two night’s stay, a four-course dinner for two, and local pumpkin beer with pumpkin chips.

Earlier this month, Yankee magazine anointed Kent, Conn., the best town in New England for viewing fall foliage. Also in Yankee’s top 10 were Bethel, Maine; Manchester, Vt.; Williamstown, Mass.; Middlebury, Vt.; Camden, Maine; Waitsfield, Vt.; Conway/North Conway, N.H.; Sandwich, N.H.; Rangeley, Maine; and Blue Hill, Maine. The magazine’s website, http://www.yankeefoliage.com, is a goldmine of information and trip ideas for the area.

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Events, ideas and destinations for fall travel (AP)

Cape Cod's scenic — and mostly flat! — bike trails (AP)

WELLFLEET, Mass. – Cycling Cape Cod in the summer is like experiencing an ice cream cone; you’ll wait in line, be surrounded by kids and end up sticky. But bike riding the Cape in the fall? That’s more like a cranberry cocktail; slightly sophisticated, cool and colorful.

Just as both refreshments are special treats, so is cycling here in either season along one of the paved, car-free paths. Here are some of the options.

CAPE COD RAIL TRAIL: This flat, 22-mile trail runs through oak trees, evergreens and marsh between Wellfleet and Dennis. It passes through Eastham, Orleans and Harwich, where a bike rotary connects a seven and a-half mile spur to Chatham. The Nickerson State park bike network connects to the rail trail and offers another eight miles of hilly cycling around ponds, lakes and bogs.

SHINING SEA BIKEWAY: This flat path runs 10.7 miles along the coast from Falmouth to Woods Hole, through salt marsh, cranberry bogs, ponds and woodlands. It’s the only bike path on Cape Cod that runs along the seashore.

PROVINCE LANDS TRAIL: This roller-coaster trail snakes for seven and a-half miles through the dunes, wetlands and beaches of the Cape Cod National Seashore near Provincetown.

CAPE COD CANAL BIKEWAY: This flat, concrete path runs about seven and a-half miles between the Bourne and Sagamore bridges, offering great views of the canal’s boat traffic.

With such great cycling options, it’s no surprise that these multi-use paths are crowded in summer, bustling with parents pushing strollers, summer camp groups and young children learning to ride. The tourists who flock to the Cape’s beaches in July and August also mean heavy car traffic, long waits for restaurants and even longer lines for ice cream, which must be gobbled up before melting in the 80-degree heat.

But after Labor Day, the visitors leave, the temperatures cool and the Cape takes on a quieter, more relaxed flavor.

“The weather is gorgeous, the crowds are done, the birds are still interesting and the ocean is right there. It’s beautiful,” said Wendy Fox of Boston, who spends many weekends in the fall cycling the Cape. “And as the weather cools down bicycling is a lot easier.”

There isn’t the vibrant autumn foliage found in Northern New England, but there are subtle changes in the oak leaves and sea grass, as well as brilliant red cranberry bogs and deep purple grapes awaiting harvest.

“And as the leaves start to drop the views improve,” Fox said.

Indeed, locals — from bike shop owners to the bicycling park ranger who patrols the rail trail — admit that fall is their favorite time to ride on the Cape. And what was good has gotten even better. Many paths have been improved in recent years. The rail trail was repaved; the Shining Sea Bikeway more than doubled in length and parts of the Province Lands Trail — which opened in 1967 as the first bike trail built by the National Park Service — were widened with funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

With little to worry about in terms of where to cycle, visitors should focus on planning other parts of their trip. Many shops and restaurants scale back their hours come September, so it’s a good idea to call first. Advance planning can also help cyclists find one of the many fall festivals on the Cape. For instance, the Truro Vineyards of Cape Cod is an easy six-mile ride from Provincetown along Route 6A anytime between May to mid-December, when it closes for the winter. But fall brings the harvest and with it the annual the Grape Stomp and Jazz Festival, on Sept. 19 this year.

On the rail trail in Eastham, Arnold’s Lobster & Clam Bar, an award-winning, fast-food style restaurant, has a loyal summer following that doesn’t mind waiting up to an hour for food. After Sept. 12, however, the restaurant and adjacent miniature golf course are only open Friday though Sunday, and they close for the season Oct. 11. (The outdoor restrooms and vending machines are left along the bike path until November.)

Still, other dining options are apt to be more accessible in the fall. A new French restaurant near the start of the rail trail in Wellfleet, PB Boulangerie Bistro, plans to close only for January. Although there was seldom a wait for dinner in the restaurant, summer vacationers were lined up nearly an hour before the bakery opened at 7 a.m. to feast on take-out croissant, brioche, bread and pastry. They snapped up nearly 250 baguettes and 1,500 plain, chocolate, and almond croissants each day, keeping the lines going until the bakery closed at 7 p.m.

Owner Boris Villatte said he couldn’t imagine crowds like that in the fall. For cyclists that’s an especially good thing. It means that after all that riding, there’s a slice of well-earned flan waiting at the end of the trail.

___

If You Go

GETTING THERE: By car, about 100 miles from Boston to Wellfleet (about two hours in the fall when traffic tie-ups are less frequent). By ferry, two companies offer a 90-minute fast ferry crossing from Boston to Provincetown. Both accept bikes. Bay State Cruise Co. runs daily until Oct. 18, 877-783-3779, http://www.baystatecruisecompany.com. Boston Harbor Cruises offers daily service until Oct. 4, and then runs again Oct. 9-10, when service stops for the season; 877-733-9425, http://www.bostonharborcruises.com. By air, Cape Air flies Boston-Provincetown daily; 866-227-3247, http://www.capeair.co

BIKING: http://www.capecodbikeguide.com offers maps and other information. You can also pick maps up at bike rental shops along the Cape Cod Rail Trail and in Provincetown. High-performance road bike rentals are available at Gale Force Bikes, 144 Bradford St. Extension, Provincetown, 508-487-4849, http://www.galeforcebikes.com (9 a.m.-5 p.m. through October, with extended hours weekends/holidays), and at Orleans Cycle, 26 Main St., Orleans, 508-255-9115, http://www.orleanscyclecapecod.com (daily through October, usually 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., call for hours or appointments later in the season).

DINING:

_Arnold’s Lobster & Clam Bar, 3580 Route 6, Eastham, 508-255-2575, http://www.arnoldsrestaurant.com. Open Friday-Sunday now through Oct. 11, 11:30 a.m.-8:30 p.m.; closed for the season after Columbus Day.

_PB Boulangerie Bistro, 15 Lecount Hollow Road, South Wellfleet, 508-349-1600. Open Wednesday-Sunday, bakery 7 a.m.-7 p.m., restaurant 5 p.m.-11 p.m. Fall hours may vary; closed for the month of January.

EVENTS:

_Grape Stomp and Jazz Festival, Sept. 19, 2 p.m.-6 p.m., Truro Vineyards, 11 Shore Rd., Route 6A, North Truro, http://www.trurovineyardsofcapecod.com. Vineyards open May-Thanksgiving, Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. and Sundays, noon-5 p.m. Free tours, 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., through Columbus Day.

_Cape Land and Sea Harvest, Sept. 24-26, tours, tastings, activities; http://www.ediblecommunities.com/clash

_Wellfleet OysterFest, town center. Oct. 16-17, local cuisine, arts and crafts, children’s activities, educational exhibits, live music, oyster-shucking competitions; http://www.wellfleetoysterfest.org/

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism, http://www.massvacation.com/fallfoliage/CAPECOD.pdf

Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce, http://www.capecodchamber.org

Provincetown Chamber of Commerce, http://www.ptownchamber.com

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Cape Cod’s scenic — and mostly flat! — bike trails (AP)

Detox Product: Useless Health Fad Or Real Cure?

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Detox Product: Useless Health Fad Or Real Cure?

Fall foliage, Southern charm in Asheville, NC (AP)

ASHEVILLE, N.C. – They’re called the Blue Ridge Mountains, but in Asheville in the fall, they might as well be called the orange, red and yellow.

The city of 76,000 in Western North Carolina with a small-town, artsy feel, has become a big-time fall foliage destination, not just for the leaves but also for festivals celebrating the area’s arts culture, beer and bluegrass music. The mix of things to see and do is especially appealing for fall travelers looking for an alternative to New England’s better-known but sometimes crowded autumn byways.

There’s no better place in the Asheville area to see the leaves than the Blue Ridge Parkway, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. The parkway intersects Asheville in several places and has miles of scenic overlooks, as well as the highest peak in the eastern U.S., and connections to hiking trails.

Starting Sept. 15, the Asheville Convention & Visitors Bureau will send out its weekly color reports to help tourists plan foliage excursions with hiking, viewing and activities tips.

And unlike New England and other parts of the Northeast, where foliage radically fades after Columbus Day, the season is longer in the South.

“We see color here all the way through, well into November, depending on the weather,” said spokeswoman Dodie Stephens, though she noted that “If we start to see those cold snaps early on, it can go relatively quickly.”

Here’s how to make the most of this fleeting, natural spectacle:

NATURE: Pick up the Blue Ridge Parkway, a stretch of 469 miles from the Great Smoky Mountains in North Carolina to Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. Its roads wind and climb through the mountains, giving expansive views of Western North Carolina. You can travel the roadway by car or bicycle. Make sure to visit the top of Mount Mitchell, an easy, but scenic hike from the parking lot. Check out the park’s restaurant on top of the mountain and enjoy the views. Sign up for the visitors bureau’s color reports at http://www.fallinthemountains.com or follow them on Twitter at FallColorHunter.

ACTIVITIES: With fall foliage as your backdrop, take a hike or go a little faster on a tour by Segway or Jeep. The visitors bureau lists activities at http://www.fallinthemountains.com and ranks them based on difficulty to make planning easy. Free hikes are separately listed for early, mid and late fall, and because leaves change first at higher altitudes, the earliest hikes of the season are higher up. You can even go in the company of a llama. The animals will carry your bags and enjoy your hike with you, promises English Mountain Llama Treks at http://www.hikinginthesmokies.com/. One-day treks with lunch range from $75 to $100.

Zip-line tours, new this year to Asheville, let you fly through the trees and climb bridges up high. Navitat Canopy Adventures at http://www.navitat.com offers 3.5-hour tours for $85 per adult.

Float in the clouds as high as 2,000 feet in a hot air balloon ride for $225 per person with Asheville Hot Air Balloons, http://www.ashevillehotairballoons.com/.

Or glide along on the ground with the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad, http://www.gsmr.com/. Its October Leaf Season trips run daily, while the Great Pumpkin Patch Express runs on weekends. The Express has Peanuts characters, apple-bobbing and more. Wear your costumes. Round-trip coach is $53 for adults and $31 for children under 12 in October.

FESTIVALS: The biannual Lake Eden Arts Festival, or LEAF — http://www.theleaf.com/ — runs from Oct. 20-23 this year in nearby Black Mountain at the site of the former Black Mountain College, an influential part of the Beat movement — and part of the reason for Asheville’s artsy vibe. The festival offers arts, activities such as yoga, musical headliners (Indigo Girls this year) and onsite camping. Tickets must be bought in advance. Attendance is limited to 5,500 people.

The North Carolina Mountain State Fair — http://www.mountainfair.org — has crafts, farm animals, and music from Sept. 10-19 in Fletcher ($7 for adults).

The Biltmore — the Vanderbilt family estate and America’s largest home — has concerts on its expansive terrace, with beautiful views of the changing trees. Remaining dates this fall are Sept. 24 featuring Christopher Cross and on Oct. 1, with Kathy Mattea. (Tickets for the concerts and general admission to the mansion start at $78.) To just visit the home, buy your tickets online for a discount. Adult one-day tickets are $5 off ($55) through October. You can get two days for the price of one for tickets booked online in September.

Plan ahead — as in, next year — for tickets to Asheville’s flagship beer event, the Brewgrass festival, which perennially sells out, as this year’s Sept. 18 event did. It pairs local breweries and bluegrass music; http://brewgrassfestival.com/.

GETTING THERE: Flying into Charlotte may save you several hundred dollars over flying into the smaller airport at Asheville. And the savings will more than pay for a rental car to drive you the pleasant two hours between the cities. A weekend trip from New York to Charlotte costs about $160 nonstop, but to Asheville on the same dates it’s $340.

Lodging options abound, from rates of about $100 for Best Western and Holiday Inn, to the more expensive The Residences at Biltmore for $260 per night.

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Fall foliage, Southern charm in Asheville, NC (AP)

Ancient city by the sea rises amid Egypt's resorts (AP)

MARINA, Egypt – Today, it’s a sprawl of luxury vacation homes where Egypt’s wealthy play on the white beaches of the Mediterranean coast. But 2,000 years ago, this was a thriving Greco-Roman port city, boasting villas of merchants grown rich on the wheat and olive trade.

The ancient city, known as Leukaspis or Antiphrae, was hidden for centuries after it was nearly wiped out by a fourth century tsunami that devastated the region.

More recently, it was nearly buried under the modern resort of Marina in a development craze that turned this coast into the summer playground for Egypt’s elite.

Nearly 25 years after its discovery, Egyptian authorities are preparing to open ancient Leukaspis’ tombs, villas and city streets to visitors — a rare example of a Classical era city in a country better known for its pyramids and Pharaonic temples.

“Visitors can go to understand how people lived back then, how they built their graves, lived in villas or traded in the main agora (square),” said Ahmed Amin, the local inspector for the antiquities department. “Everyone’s heard of the resort Marina, now they will know the historic Marina.”

The history of the two Marinas is inextricably linked. When Chinese engineers began cutting into the sandy coast to build the roads for the new resort in 1986, they struck the ancient tombs and houses of a town founded in the second century B.C.

About 200 acres were set aside for archaeology, while everywhere else along the coast up sprouted holiday villages for Egyptians escaping the stifling summer heat of the interior for the Mediterranean’s cool breezes.

The ancient city yielded up its secrets in a much more gradual fashion to a team of Polish archaeologists excavating the site through the 1990s.

A portrait emerged of a prosperous port town, with up to 15,000 residents at its height, exporting grains, livestock, wine and olives to the rest of the Mediterranean.

Merchants lived in elegant two-story villas set along zigzagging streets with pillared courtyards flanked by living and prayer rooms.

Rainwater collected from roofs ran down special hollowed out pillars into channels under the floor leading to the family cisterns. Waste disappeared into a sophisticated sewer system.

Around the town center, where the two main streets intersect, was the social and economic heart of the city and there can still be found the remains of a basilica, a hall for public events that became a church after Christianity spread across the Roman Empire.

A semicircular niche lined with benches underneath a portico provided a space for town elders to discuss business before retiring to the bathhouse across the street.

Greek columns and bright limestone walls up to six feet high (2 meters) stand in some places, reflecting the sun in an electric blue sky over the dark waters of the nearby sea. Visitors will also be able to climb down the steep shafts of the rock-cut tombs to the deeply buried burial chambers of the city’s necropolis.

It is from the sea from which the city gained much of its livelihood. It began as a way station in the coastal trade between Egypt and Libya to the west. Later, it began exporting goods from its surrounding farms overseas, particularly to the island of Crete, just 300 miles (480 kilometers) away — a shorter trip than that from Egypt’s main coastal city Alexandria.

And from the sea came its end. Leukaspis was largely destroyed when a massive earthquake near Crete in 365 A.D. set off a tsunami wave that also devastated nearby Alexandria. In the ensuing centuries, tough economic times and a collapsing Roman Empire meant that most settlements along the coast disappeared.

Today, the remains of the port are lost. In the late 1990s, an artificial lagoon was built, surrounded by summer homes for top government officials.

“It was built by dynamite detonation so whatever was there I think is gone,” said Agnieszka Dobrowlska, an architect who helped excavate the ancient city with the Polish team in the 1990s.

However, Egyptian government interest in the site rose in the last few years, part of a renewed focus on developing the country’s Classical past. In 2005, Dobrowlska returned as part of a USAID project to turn ancient Marina into an open air museum for tourists.

It couldn’t have come at a better time for ancient Marina, which had long attracted covetous glances from real estate developers.

“I am quite happy it still exists, because when I was involved there were big plans to incorporate this site in a big golf course being constructed by one of these tycoons. Apparently the antiquities authorities didn’t allow it, so that’s quite good,” recalls Dobrowlska.

Redoing the site is part of a plan to bring more year-around tourism to what is now largely a summer destination for just Egyptians — perhaps with a mind to attracting European tourists currently flocking to beaches in nearby Tunisia during the winter.

Much still needs to be done to achieve the government’s target to open the site by mid-September, as ancient fragments of pottery still litter the ground and bones lie open in their tombs.

But if old Marina is a success then similar transformation could happen to a massive temple of Osiris just 30 miles (50 kilometers) away, where a Dominican archaeological team is searching for the burial place of the doomed Classical lovers, Anthony and Cleopatra.

“The plan is to do the same for Taposiris Magna so that tourists can visit both,” said Khaled Aboul- Hamd, antiquities director for the region.

These north coast ruins may also attract the attention of the visitors to the nearby El-Alamein battlefield and cemeteries for the World War II battle that Winston Churchill once called the turning point of the war.

In fact, there are signs the allied troops took refuge in the deep rock cut tombs of Marina, just six miles (10 kilometers) from the furthest point of the Axis advance on Alexandria.

Crouched down awaiting the onslaught of German Gen. Rommel’s famed Afrika Corps, the young British Tommies would have shared space with the rib bones and skull fragments of Marina’s inhabitants in burial chambers hidden 25 feet (8 meters) below ground.

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Ancient city by the sea rises amid Egypt’s resorts (AP)

North Carolina experiencing rebirth in winemaking (AP)

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – North Carolina is known for basketball, beaches and barbecue. But wine doesn’t necessarily come to mind when thinking about the Tar Heel State.

Yet North Carolina is home to over 90 wineries and has three American Viticultural Areas (AVAs) — Yadkin Valley, Swan Creek and Haw River Valley. For an AVA designation, 85 percent of the grapes have to be grown in the region and there must be a distinctive combination of soil and climate. This results in an identifiable regional wine character, also known as an appellation or district.

The number of wineries in North Carolina has more than quadrupled since 2001. Currently, the state ranks seventh in wine production in the United States. The growing industry has two focuses — native muscadine grapes and European-style vinifera grapes.

While North Carolina winemaking may seem to be in its infancy now, it’s actually more of a rebirth. The state’s first commercial winery opened in 1835. At the turn of the 20th century, 25 wineries were in operation, making it one of the most productive states in the U.S. But Prohibition effectively shut the industry down and land was turned over to lucrative and legal crops, like tobacco.

Several of the vineyards of Swan Creek, located in the northwest part of the state, in fact, are located on the sites of former tobacco farms. There are five wineries in this area within about 16 miles of each other and all are as distinctive as the varieties of grapes they grow. They are family owned and operated and small in terms of wine production. The largest single winery is Raffaldini Vineyards, which produces 5,000 to 6,000 cases per year. All specialize in European-style grape varieties.

The area is an easy hour drive from Charlotte, straight up Interstate 77. Once you get off the highway, a wine trail meanders on two-lane roads through lush, rolling farmland of the Yadkin Valley between the Brushy Mountains and the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. These ranges provide a sandy, loamy, soil for grape cultivation. In fall, you’ll be surrounded by dramatic mountain scenes and vibrant autumn colors in this heavily forested region.

First stop on your tour of Swan Creek should be Laurel Gray Vineyards, in the town of Hamptonville (where four of the five wineries on the trail are located). The winery is owned by Benny and Kim Myers and named after their son and daughter. The first grapes were planted here in 2001 on land that has been in the Myers family for 10 generations. Laurel Gray was honored with the 2009 Winegrowers of Excellence in North Carolina award and grows chardonnay, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc, viognier, syrah and pinot gris grapes. The winery produces 1,500 to 1,800 cases of wine per year. Like most boutique wineries, its wine and other products can only be purchased on a trip to the vineyard.

Laurel Gray’s charming tasting room is located in a converted 1930s milking parlor and is surrounded by English rose gardens. There’s a relaxing front porch and patio for leisurely sipping with a view of the vineyards and mountains in the distance. Don’t miss the honeysuckle aromas of the viognier or the intense smokiness of the estate reserve cabernet sauvignon.

Your next stop will be the grand and majestic Raffaldini Vineyards, located in Ronda. A Tuscan-style villa suddenly and incongruously springs up from the rural hills and valleys of Wilkes County. This terracotta and stucco structure was inspired by the villas in Mantua, Italy, where the Raffaldini family has lived since 1348. When the family came to the United States in the 1950s, they wanted to preserve their home winemaking tradition, and visited 60 spots around the country before choosing the current location in 2001. Raffaldini was recently named one of the top 10 hot small brands of 2009 by Wine Business Monthly, a trade publication.

Raffaldini specializes in Italian grape varieties and grows two dozen types on 43 acres. It is the only exclusively Italian winery in North Carolina and one of relatively few vineyards in the country to grow the vermentino grape. Vermentino is the premier white of Southern Italy and Raffaldini’s version is marvelously crisp and mineral-rich. You can also sample wines made from sangiovese (the predominant grape in Chianti), montepulciano, malbec, petit verdot, tempranillo, moscato, pinot grigio, and petit manseng. Spectacular mountain and vineyard panoramas can be seen from either the first floor piazza-like patio or upstairs balcony of the villa.

Your next visit is back in Hamptonville, to Dobbins Creek Vineyards, one of the newer members of the Swan Creek AVA. Retiree Charles King planted his first vines on his father’s former tobacco farm in 2002 and the winery opened to the public in April 2008. Dobbins Creek produces 900 cases a year and King grows merlot, cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, chardonnay and riesling. There are only a few riesling producers in the state as the humidity makes it tough for the grape to flourish here, but King says it’s his favorite and worth the extra effort. The tasting room is an expansive and airy log cabin with hickory plank floors and a large stone fireplace. The wine bar itself is covered in 100-year-old cherry wood harvested from the property.

Buck Shoals Vineyards, in the heart of North Carolina’s Amish country, is also in Hamptonville. A nearby bakery and deli is a popular stop for wine tasters to refuel, and horse-drawn buggies can often be seen on the surrounding roads.

Owned by Terry and Joanne Crater, the vineyard’s land has been in the Crater family for five generations and until 2002 was a tobacco farm. Buck Shoals opened in 2004 and grows 10 ten varieties: merlot, cabernet sauvignon, nebbiolo, sangiovese, barbera, pinot grigio, traminette, chardonnay and viognier. The winery produces about 5,000 cases a year. Buck Shoals is the only winery in the state with a legal distillery producing award-winning meads (a mead is any beverage fermented with honey). Buck Shoals also makes Midnight Royal, a port-style beverage with all local ingredients, and La Gloria, which is a ratafia (basically a white wine port) that’s very sweet. The cozy tasting room is also in a log cabin and features a covered back deck for sipping before a tableau of the vineyards and mountains.

Right down the road from Buck Shoals is Shadow Springs Vineyard, the newest addition to the Swan Creek AVA. Shadow Springs’ first vines were planted in 2005 (again, on land that most recently grew tobacco) and the winery opened for tastings in June 2008. Owned by Chuck and Jamey Johnson, Shadow Springs grows merlot, seyval blanc, cabernet franc, chardonnay, viognier, petit verdot, chambourcin and cabernet sauvignon. Their tasting room is bright and modern and fully equipped with the latest technology. There’s a sun room and patio overlooking a spring-fed lake with a vineyard vista. Shadow Springs is best known for its dessert wines, Shortcake and Dark Shadow. Shortcake is made completely of strawberries and Dark Shadow is made from cabernet sauvignon, seyval blanc and dark chocolate, added right before the wine is bottled. Buck Shoals offers 14 different wines and produce about 2,500 cases per year.

“Tasting is believing,” says Margo Knight Metzger, spokeswoman for North Carolina’s Divison of Tourism and former executive director of the North Carolina Wine & Grape Council. “The wine industry here has a bright future.”

All the winery owners say their greatest reward is in meeting different types of people, along with the reaction of customers trying something new and discovering they like it. Discover North Carolina wine for yourself — and don’t be afraid to try a local cabernet with that ‘cue.

___

If You Go…

SWAN CREEK AMERICAN VITICULTURAL AREA: Information, maps and directions to the five Swan Creek wineries at http://www.swancreekvineyards.com/. All the wineries are open to the public Wednesday-Sunday. Tastings, $4 to $5. Most wineries also include a commemorative glass with the tasting price.

NORTH CAROLINA WINE TRAIL: More than 20 itineraries, events, directions, maps, hours and contact information for the state’s 90-plus wineries: http://www.visitncwine.com/

UPCOMING EVENTS: Vineyards of Swan Creek Annual Harvest Festival, Oct. 9-10. Yadkin Valley Grape Festival, Yadkinville, N.C., Oct. 16, http://yvgf.com/. Swan Creek Vineyards Annual Holiday Open House, Dec. 4-5.

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North Carolina experiencing rebirth in winemaking (AP)