At Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, celebrity chef Rick Bayless has opened Tortas Frontera, in Terminal 1.  The menu includes Mexican sandwiches, tortas, a guacamole bar and a wide variety of other tasty dishes.  (Another branch will open soon in Terminal 3).

Today Amtrak announced that there’s now free Wi-Fi on the Cascades route between Eugene, OR and Vancouver, B.C.

And with the opening of a branch of the Saxon Pub (an iconic music venue in Austin), there are now five venues that offer live music at Austin Bergstrom International Airport for a total of 13 shows each week.

Saxon Pub ribbon cutting ceremony, photo by Carlton Wade

DFW International Airport is big.

Within its 30 square miles are five terminals, two full-service hotels, a multi-million dollar collection of art and a golf course. There’s also Founders’ Plaza: DFW’s public observation park.

The park has the airport’s original beacon, along with shaded picnic tables, viewing stations and a live audio feed of the radio conversations from the air traffic control tower.

And now it has six, black-granite sidewalk medallions, each four-feet in diameter.

Laser-etched into the surface of each medallion is information about the history of the airport and of commercial aviation in north Texas. A different piece of the story is told on each medallion.

Want to see them for yourself? Founders’ Plaza is located at North Airfield Drive and Texan Trail, just south of State Highway 114 in Grapevine.

No time to leave the terminals? No problem. DFW has some nifty stuff inside as well. My favorites: the Cereality breakfast bar where you choose cereal and toppings and pajama-clad Cereologists fill up the bowl; the two La Bodega Winery locations and all the great artwork in Terminal D.

Photos courtesy DFW Airport.

This week, we ponder why the Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR)- which is definitely located in New Jersey – has stores stocked with so many souvenirs that promote New York City.

I’m not complaining.

Last time through, I was also pleased to see that EWR also had a branch of the iconic Oyster Bar & Restaurant from Manhattan’s Grand Central Station.

EWR also has a few other new restaurants to check out on your next layover:

Currito Cantina and Tony Roma’s in Terminal A, Blue Point RA Bar (raw bar) and Champps Americana in Terminal B and Hamachi Sushi in Terminal C.

Did you find some great souvenirs last time you were stuck at the airport?

If the price tags are around $10, and the souvenirs are “of” the city or region and, ideally a bit offbeat, please snap a photo and send it along.

Your souvenir may be featured on a future edition of Souvenir Sunday.

Lufthansa pilots have scheduled a four day strike beginning on Monday, February 22, 2010.  Negotiations are currently underway, but if those talks fail to avert the strike, the carrier will be forced to cancel most of its flights. And that will leave passengers stuck at the airport.

The upside? If you do end up spending more time than you planned at a German airport, you’ll be able to find plenty of things to do.

Munich Airport, for example, has an outdoor observation deck and a great indoor/outdoor beer garden with an on-site brewery.

The Hamburg Airport also has observation decks as well as the Airport Model Exhibition – a miniature version of the airport complete with buildings, taxiways, runways, landing strips, and 8,000 light-emitting diodes that light up the tiny airport’s night sky – all on a scale of 1:500.

And at the Dusseldorf, Munich, Hamburg, and Berlin airports you’ll also find Lufthansa WorldShop stores, which offer a promising spot to do some Souvenir Sunday shopping.

The airline recently opened its second WorldShop store at the Frankfurt Airport (Terminal 1, Area B) and, like the others; the store is filled with travel items, backpacks, travel accessories, electronics, model aircraft, toys, and some other fun stuff.  Shoppers can earn Miles & More award miles for items purchased here and – here’s a nice twist – also buy items using accumulated miles.

I’m especially taken with this A380 Cookie Jar

The cool container sells for about $107 – or 22,000 miles, so we can’t make it our pick for Souvenir Sunday, which usually has an upper limit of $10.  But poking around the WorldShop catalog I did find this cute guy, which sells for 9 Euros (about $12) or 7500 miles.

But since this is Souvenir Sunday and do we have that under $10 rule (which may need to be re-adjusted soon for inflation..),  we offer these items sent along by the folks at Virginia’s Richmond International Airport(RIC), where a variety of local museums are represented in the  Hudson News store in the airport’s Atrium area, next to the security screening checkpoint for Concourse B.

These items are from the Edgar Allan Poe Museum

(Beer mugs! )

(Poe action figure – with removable raven! )

Have you found a great souvenir while stuck at the airport? If it’s under $10, “of” the city or region and, ideally, a bit offbeat, please snap a photo and send it along. It may show up as our pick for a future Souvenir Sunday.

Munich, Germany’s official Oktoberfest celebration is winding down now and many folks have no doubt spent all their time hanging out at the fairgrounds drinking oversize mugs of beer instead of shopping for lovely gifts for their loved ones.

So it’s a good thing that the traditional Oktoberfest frosted gingerbread, or lebkuchen, hearts sold all over town this time of year are also sold at the Munich Airport (MUC).

(Kimberly Krol of Global Traveler models a welcome cookie)

The cookies come in all sizes and most of the ones I saw (and bought) at the airport are priced under $10.

If you can get them home without tearing off the plastic and having a few nibbles, then these offbeat, very much “of the city” cookies are a perfect Souvenir Sunday purchase.

If you don’t think you can be trusted not to nibble during that long flight home, then I offer these little guys, also found at MUC, as a safe Souvenir Sunday option.

Have you found a great souvenir at the an airport?  If it’s under $10, “of’ the city, and somewhat offbeat, then please snap a photo and send it along. It may be featured on a future edition of Souvenir Sunday here at StuckatTheAirport.com.

(Photo courtesy Munich Tourist Office)

Oktoberfest, the two week long festival that runs this year through October 4th, is in full swing in Munich, Germany right now.  The celebration is one part mega-county fair and the rest – well, as I learned during an evening in the Hippodrome tent with local journalists and our hosts from Lufthansa airlines and Munich Airport – it’s as advertised: all about drinking, eating, and singing with a few thousand brand new best friends.

(Photo courtesy Munich Airport)

For my much tamer introduction to German beer and beer culture, I first visited the Airbräu, the micro-brewery set in the large public area between the two terminals at Munich Airport.  Currently celebrating its 10th anniversary, this was Europe’s first airport microbrewery and seems to be as popular with locals as it is with travelers.

Outdoors, there’s a large, festive beer garden that’s open from May through October. Indoors, the restaurant shares space with giant kettles and other machinery needed to produce about 115,000 gallons of beer each year.

There are other entertaining amenities at Munich Airport, which I’ll report on here shortly, but all in all, the Airbräu is a fun way to spend a few hours if you find yourself stuck at Munich Airport.

STL’s two gated pet parks are each 400 square feet, with park benches, trash cans, plastic clean-up mitts and fire hydrants.  The Main Terminal park has synthetic turf and is on the upper level, just outside exit MT-6. The East Terminal pet park has natural grass and some tree shade and is located outside baggage claim on the lower level

STL also has some new perks for people: two new pre-security dining venues.

Brioche Dorée Café serves salads, sandwiches, pastries, and other casual menu items. Missouri Vineyards, serves wines from local boutique vineyards (who knew?) and beyond.  In addition to a menu that includes fruit & cheese plates and other small bites, Missouri Vineyards will have regular Thursday wine tasting events.

There are plenty of jet-lag remedies floating around out there. Some work. Others work only if you say a special chant.   One way to insure jet-lag, as well as a hangover: an airport pub crawl that includes some – or all – of the spots in this Forbes Traveler article: America’s Best Airport Bars.

Recommended spots include:  Vino Volo wine bars in Washington, D.C, Seattle, Detroit and other cities;  Cibi Bistro and Wine Bar at PHL,  DEN’s New Belgium Hub Bar & Grill, the Woodford Reserve Bar & Grill at the Louisville, Kentucky Airport, re:vive at JFK’s Terminal 5,  Laurelwood Brewing Company pubs at PDX, and the Shipyard Brewing Company at Maine’s Portland Int’l Jetport.

Also on the list: the Sweetwater Draft House at ATL, the Heineken Lounge at EWR,  and Squatters Pub and the Wasatch Brew Pub, both at the Salt Lake City airport.

Drink up, but bring aspirin.

If you find yourself stuck in Terminal C at Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) anytime soon, you can now entertain yourself with a pub crawl.

Post-security watering holes now include the Guinness Irish Pub, the Heineken Lounge, Sam Adams bar and restaurant,  and a branch of the Vino Volo wine bar.

By all means print it out and tuck this guide into your carry-on.  That way, if you’re stuck at the airport in Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Denver or any of the 20 airports listed in the guide, you’ll know who’s pouring micro-brews where.