Shoppers, gamblers, trolley enthusiasts, history buffs and foodies all have one thing in common -- a reason to visit Washington County.

At least that was the idea behind a recent bus tour of county attractions for people who book tours for groups from northeastern Ohio. Sponsored by the Washington County Tourism Promotion Agency, the tour took 23 people representing seniors' groups and Girl Scouts around the county earlier this month.

Tourism agency Executive Director J.R. Shaw wanted the visitors to get a taste of the kind of group-friendly attractions available in the county, "so they will go back and sell Washington County as a destination to their group members."

The area has had bus tours in the past, but the casino and outlet stores have been a boon to the area, he said.

"[Mr. Shaw's] enthusiasm and knowledge of the area really make him a good ambassador for this area," said Allen R. Kinney, president and chief executive officer of Great Day! Tours, the company that conducted the bus tour.

The first-day itinerary for the visitors included downtown Washington, holiday tours of the Bradford and LeMoyne houses, lunch at the Spring House, a stop at the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum and restored car barn in Chartiers, dinner and recreation time at The Meadows Racetrack and Casino in North Strabane and an overnight stay at the Hampton Inn & Suites near the Meadows.

On the second day, they took a morning trip to the Meadowcroft Rockshelter and Museum of Rural Life in Jefferson, a shopping excursion to Tanger Outlets in South Strabane and a stop at Sarris Candies in Canonsburg before heading back to Cleveland.

Mr. Kinney said the tour officials were charged about $25 to attend. If people book tours back to the area through his company, they will be reimbursed for the charge.

Olive Jones has been organizing tours for the Ashtabula County Council on Aging in Ashtabula, Ohio, for seven years. She has traveled previously with Great Day! Tours and has visited the Laurel Mountains in Pennsylvania.

She believes in seeing places in person before booking trips for her group.

Mrs. Jones enjoyed the trolley museum and said she would love to return to the area in the fall, perhaps as part of a two- or three-day trip that included Washington County as well as the Sept. 11, 2001, crash site in Shanksville and the Quecreek Mine in Somerset County, where nine miners were rescued after being trapped for three days in 2002.

Another fan of the trolley museum, Jean Dean, of the Stow Sunshine Senior Group in Stow, Ohio, had been to the casino before and said she would like to bring her group to visit all of the places she saw except Meadowcroft, because it requires too much walking.

"A lot of my people like trains and that and I like them, too," she said about her visit to the trolley museum.

She also said the excursions had been "nice, really nice" and that everybody was friendly.

Trolleys would be exciting for the young and old, apparently. Nancy Troutman, who organizes trips for four Girl Scout troops from Brook Park, Ohio, loved the trolley museum and riding on a trolley.

"That's something I could take the girls on and they'd be ecstatic," she said.

Ms. Troutman also believes the girls would like Meadowcroft Village, especially the one-room schoolhouse. She, along with some others on the tour, spent some time in the schoolhouse, where a teacher had visitors read from McGuffey Readers, led them in a 1892 version of the "Pledge of Allegiance" and had them exercise by standing next to their desks, holding out their arms and moving them in circles.

"They'd be getting history without realizing they were learning," she said. "This has been fun and I've learned a lot."

The girls could earn badges in everything from history to hiking. Ms. Troutman will talk to the Scouts, ages 4 through 10, and their parents to see if they're interested in visiting the county. If they are, they'll have to sell many boxes of cookies and maybe hold candy sales to pay for the trip. They can earn $3,000 from cookie sales, Ms. Troutman said.

"The whole trip has been very entertaining," said Dottie Hitch-Masek, who organizes trips for AARP in Maple Heights, Ohio.

She thought the trip to the David Bradford House in Washington was very interesting and a part of history everyone should know. The Bradford House was built in 1788 and was home to the Whiskey Rebellion. The group also visited the LeMoyne House in Washington, which was the first National Historic Landmark of the Underground Railroad.

Mrs. Hitch-Masek said she would like to come back, probably in September.

"I think it's something my seniors group would like to see," she said. "These are hidden treasures people don't know about."

The county tourism agency hopes to host more bus tours to attract visitors from Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, West Virginia and New York as well as from Canada, where tourists especially enjoy buying tax-free clothing, Mr. Shaw said.