On the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary, the Annual Hocking Hills Winter Hike set an attendance record with over 5300 people attending. Five hundred lucky people received a commemorative hiking stick. Bob and I just hiked the Old Man's Cave portion of the hike this year.
Officially the hike begins at 9 a.m., but many hikers arrive early.
Staff members of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) were on hand to give 500 lucky individuals a commemorative hiking stick. Read more ➜ 50th Annual Hocking Hills Winter Hike, January 2015
On the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary, the Annual Hocking Hills Winter Hike set an attendance record with over 5300 people attending. Five hundred lucky people received a commemorative hiking stick. Bob and I just hiked the Old Man's Cave portion of the hike this year.
Officially the hike begins at 9 a.m., but many hikers arrive early.
Staff members of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) were on hand to give 500 lucky individuals a commemorative hiking stick. Read more ➜ 
This is describing a fair visit from 2014. The upcoming fair is being held July 26 – August 6, 2017.
Yesterday we went to the Ohio State Fair. The state fair is one of the largest in country and is held every year toward the end of July and the beginning of August at the 360 acre Ohio Expo Center in Columbus, Ohio. The original Ohio State Fair started in 1850 and today's fair retains much of the early fairs agricultural roots.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) has 
We happened to be at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium for the final day of a three-day pumpkin carving contest (it was held Sept. 20-22). On this last day the competitors were asked to carve a single, large, freestyle pumpkin. We enjoyed seeing the carvers at work and looking at pumpkins that were carved earlier in the contest, and it seemed like a nice topic to start of the month of October. Since the contest was being held at a zoo, many of the carvings explored the zoo and aquarium theme.
In 
We attended the 15th annual Pawpaw festival at Lake Snowden, Ohio. The pawpaw is a native Ohio fruit and was the main attraction of the festival.
We tried some cut-up raw pawpaw. The fruit is green and about the size of a potato. Inside it is either white or orangish with large brown or black seeds. The consistency is like custard, and I thought the taste (which can vary) was a mix of melon and papaya.
A variety of pawpaw derived foods were available, including pawpaw 
I am an aspiring birder; actually, I seem to be perpetually stuck at the "beginning birder" level. I enjoy and recognize the birds that frequent my backyard feeding station. And when hiking, I enjoy listening to birdsong and calls... but I rarely catch sight of those singing birds. Most of the time they seem to be perched high above me and hidden by the tree's foliage. However in Ohio there is an annual birding event called, The Biggest Week in American Birding, and this year I decided to give it 
Good news! Regional groundhogs predict an early spring!
You've probably heard of Pennsylvania's famous Punxsutawney Phil, but you may not have realized that Ohio has its very own springtime prognosticator. His name is Buckeye Chuck. Buckeye Chuck lives in Marion, Ohio, and he has been foretelling spring since the 1970s. Despite the frigid weather, hundreds gathered in Marion this morning to learn whether Buckeye Chuck could see his shadow. It turns out that he could NOT, I repeat, NOT 
You may not have heard of it, but there really is a Squirrel Appreciation Day. Although not officially sanctioned by any government (that I know of), Squirrel Appreciation Day was founded by wildlife rehabilitator Christy Hargrove in 2001, and it falls on January 21st of each year. He believes that a good way to commemorate this winter holiday would be by putting out some extra food for the squirrels in your yard. In the slideshow below, you can see an Eastern gray squirrel helping himself to food 
Earlier we posted an Ohio Christmas Events Calendar, and last night Bob and I chose to go to one of the events being held in central Ohio: the Wildlights exhibit at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. A lot of zoos are now doing an annual holiday lights display, and if you can make it to one of these, they are a lot of fun for the whole family. Here's what the display looks like in Columbus.
The Galapagos turtle display is in the most special 
On Friday (06/29/2012) violent thunderstorms with high winds swept through Ohio leaving hundreds of thousands of people without electric power. Many will not have power restored for a week. The storm damage was due to a phenomenon that meteorologists call a 'derecho'. A derecho is a sustained, straight-line, strong wind accompanying severe thunderstorms. Wind speeds of 82 MPH were measured at Don Scott Field in NW Columbus (that's hurricane force).
Early Sunday morning, we drove to