Cincinnati: Events

Valentine's Day getting you down? Escape all that romantic muck for he-man's heaven at the Cavalcade of Customs in February, where you can drool over hot rods, dragsters, custom vans and monster trucks. Sommeliers and amateur cork-sniffers can toss phrases like 'precociously impertinent' and 'hint of cigar box' during the International Wine Festival , held in early March. Serious beer drinkers can stumble through the country's second-largest St Patrick's Day Parade later that month. The city becomes a field of red baseball caps and everybody calls in sick on the Cincinnati Reds' Opening Day in April.

Kids will go gaga during June's Zoo Babies festival at the Cincinnati Zoo, when captive animal young go on display. Though the city shoots off a few bottle rockets to celebrate Independence Day on July 4, the biggest party of the year is Labor Day's Riverfest , when the city's real fireworks show lights up the first Monday in September. Hundreds of boats pack the river, and half a million revellers crowd the banks of the Ohio. The city's German heritage is celebrated later in the month during Octoberfest-Zinzinnati , when the streets are slick with pilsner and sauerkraut. You can start the holidays early during mid-November's Festival of Lights , when the Cincinnati Zoo is festooned with two million lights.