Ridgeview Farms Country Tours

In the Geauga County/Trumbull County Amish area, Sharon Grover conducts bus tours for large groups (reservations required). She’s on friendly terms with Amish neighbors who welcome visitors to their home-based businesses for conversation and a little low-key crafting. At the Amish Home Craft Shop & Bakery, quilter Emma Miller teaches tourists how to make a potholder; baker Ivan Bender teaches them how to make a flaky pie crust at the Countryside Home Bakery. The tour also includes a visit to an Amish one-room school — after the kids have gone home — and a stop at the End of the Commons General Store in Mesopotamia, an antebellum bulk-food emporium where the Amish have been shopping for 150 years.

Grover also posts a drive-it-yourself tour with maps and suggestions on her Web site.

Ridgeview Farms Country Tours,

5488 Kinsman Rd., Middlefield 44062, 440/693-4000.

www.ridgeviewfarmtours.com