Our First Trip

Our first trip, which we called The Long and Winery Road (later renamed The Long and Winery Road II) began just north of I-64 in Louisa County. The girls had tasted Cooper's Sweet Louisa and were dying to visit the winery where it was produced. But on the way, we passed a sign fro Grey Haven. (This was before we discovered the Virginia Winery Guide map, our bible now.)

At Grey Haven, we learned about the Heart of VA wine trail. For a small fee, you visited the five wineries on the trail, they stamped your card, and at the end you got something, which I can't remember now. So, on that day, we visited Grey Haven (where the server was an entertaining South African) and Cooper (where they had food and music set up outside), saw the sign for Bumpass, VA (had to take a picture), fought the crowds at Lake Anna, and ended up at the mecca of our pilgrimage: Horton.

At that time our palates were pretty unsophisticated, and we mostly enjoyed sweeter, fruitier wines. We went to Horton for the peach and pear and raspberry and plum wines. But we discovered, they had a wide array and a huge selection of wines. (To this day, a tasting at Horton will get you the best bang for your buck, as they have a couple of dozen wines and charge nothing.) I think that was when Mike and I started showing a little interest in drier, red wines.

We left for dinner, then the hotel. I happened to mention in passing a restaurant just south of Harrisonburg that had a pretty mediocre buffet, but included delicious slices of almost every pie imaginable. Despite the 60-something-mile detour over the winding, mountainous roads of rt. 33, we headed for Mrs. Rowe's Country Buffet. (And yes, I called ahead and asked if they were a buffet.) We all did our best to neglect the entrees and vegetables as much as possible, but only Mike skipped the dinner foods completely and focused on the pies. I think he had 8 slices. BTW, my favorite of theirs is the French Apple (or am I supposed to say Freedom Apple?).

Full, slightly hung over, and tired, we headed back to our hotel to get a good night's sleep and get ready for day 2.

The Beginning

Our journey actually began in June of 2006. I was in NY visiting my parents, when Diane awoke with severe chest pains. It's possible to make this a long story, but the bottom line is that she spent the next two years trying to figure out what was wrong with her. There were medical tests, trial medications, and diet modifications. Throughout most of this time, she could not consume any alcohol. My cousin, Michael, who is a phyicisian in CT, suggested a possible diagnosis, which I then researched on the internet. You can imagine the attitude of Diane's gastro-enterologist, when ignorant old me mentioned esophogeal spasms. He politely dismissed my ideas and continue his own diagnostic trail. In the meantime, we battled our insurance company to have tests done that were considered "experimental", and I regularly offered to urinate (or worse) on the doctor's office wall. (Why she wouldn't let me, who knows.)

Finally, the GE doctor sent her to see a specialist at MCV in Richmond. He actually LISTENED to the detailed history that Diane had been keeping. He quickly suggested a specific test (which the other jerk had dismissed as unlikely to give us usable information), which told us . . . that Diane had espohogeal problems. This was almost a year and a half after I first mentioned this to the first GE. The solution was mostly medication and a slightly altered diet. Diane didn't have the nerve to ask, but I did. "What about drinking alcohol?" The answer was to stay away from hard liquor and carbonated drinks, like beer. "Was wine okay?" "Yes."

So with this new knowledge in hand, we invited our best friends, Deb and Mike, to go to a local wine festival. We had so much fun that someone suggested a weekend visiting wineries. There are a slew of them, but we chose a handful in the Charlottesville area.

It was during that first trip that we learned A) There were over 150 wineries in the state and B) It would be possible to visit each and every one at least once.

Check us out on Facebook

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Barrel Oak and Chatham Street

Our weekend ended with a visit to Barrel Oak, drinking sangria, and listening to Chatham Street (Google: Chatham Street music). We had just a great time, and we hated to see the weekend end. Although we hit "only" 8 new wineries on this trip, it was great to be back on the trail. The highlights were Piedmont, Chateau O'Brien, and Paradise Springs. Our next big milestone will be #100. We're up to 82, so we need about two more weekends to get to 99. Then we can decide where #100 will be.

Latest Trip

We're sitting in the lobby of the Comfort Suites in Manassas, enjoying the afterglow of another incrdible wine weekend. We hit wineries 75-82, only spit away from 100. Much more to share, but we just wanted to give a special shout out to Paradise Springs, a new winery in Fairfax with wonderful historic atmosphere. Ask for Kirk. He left his post at Homeland Security to serve a more important post: making America safe for wine drinkers. More later . . .

Change of Plans

It's a dirty job, but . . . As it turns out, Woodland won't be able to accomodate us this weekend, so instead we're planning another NoVA trip. We heard Chatham Street will be playing at Rappahanock Cellars on Saturday, so we're trying to hit 5 wineries in and around Front Royal. Our biggest concern at this point is weather and road conditions. In case you haven't heard, the DC area just got a double whammy of snow in major proportions. Cross your fingers that by Saturday, the roads will be clear and the wineries will be open. Our tentative list:

• Chester Gap
• Rappahannock
• Linden
• Phillip Carter
• Miracle Valley

If all goes well, these will be 75, 76, 77, 78, and 79. (Seventy-nine is my lucky number!)

Looking forward to hitting the road again

Mike and Deb are coming down to Williamsburg for a week, so the PoLo wine club will be on the prowl again. We're only planning to hit one next weekend -- Woodland, which is somewhere near Richmond. The following weekend we're going to make our second trip up the Northern Neck and hit a few wineries we missed last year: Athena, The Hague, and Hummel. We'll also make repeat visits to Vault and Ingleside. So . . . that will be # 75-78. We hope to hit 100 by the summer. Now, that will be a great milestone. It'll be important that we choose a special winery for #100.