Her eyes twinkle as she tells visitors that she's named some of the wines in honor of former residents of the house, built in 1834, and which, she says, is home to six ghosts �?five human, one dog.

"One of the ghosts, Shubal Merritt, died on a Thursday at 3 o'clock," Bittner says, picking up a bottle of a white grape and peach fruit blend called, of course, Thursday Afternoon at 3. There's also a dry red Lord of the Manor wine, and the sweet red Lady of the Manor.

Close to the shores of Lake Ontario in Appleton, N.Y., Marjim Manor adds a bit of spooky fun to our tour of the Niagara Wine Trail. If you do the grapes of math, you'll count nearly a dozen wineries that opened their doors here in the past decade �?seven of them since 2004.

Autumn is a scenic time of year to visit the trail, which also hosts monthly events, like a Sept. 29-30 Harvest Fest and an Oct. 27-28 Hallowine Murder Mystery, where you pick up a clue at each winery. The wineries are all located in Western New York's rural Niagara County, bounded by Lake Ontario in the north and the base of a bluff, known as the Niagara Escarpment, to the south. In this micro-climate, the warming effect of the lake extends the growing season north of the Escarpment, where thousands of years ago the rich deposits left by the receding glacier created the fertile beginnings for growing fruits and premium grapes.