Even though Mom (LaGayle) and Dad (John) were recently in Walla Walla as a part of their two month cross-country road trip (see Dad’s previous Walla Walla posts: Day 1 and Day 2), all of us Wine Peeps recently spent a weekend in the Walla Walla Valley visiting some wineries that Mom and Dad missed […]

The wine industry around Chelan, Washington, is relatively new, with a mixture of what I call “foo-foo” wineries and serious winemakers. The tourist industry in the area will probably keep the former in business, while I’m interested to see how the serious winemakers progress as their vineyards mature and they see what works and doesn’t […]

As our road trip took us to Spokane, Washington, we tried to visit a representative sampling of wineries in the Spokane area. Our first stop was at Latah Creek Winery. Latah Creek, owned by Mike Conway and his wife, has been in business 26 years and produces about 15,000 cases per year. Our friendly hostess, […]

The Rhone Rangers—Advancing the knowledge & enjoyment of Rhone grapes grown in America and of the wines produced from those grapes. Last Tuesday, Dad (John) and I attended the Rhone Rangers Trade/Media Tasting in Seattle. The Rhone Rangers are a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting American Rhone varietal wines. To be members, wineries must produce […]

On our second day in Walla Walla, Washington, during our cross-country road trip, we visited five wineries. All of them were new to us, but they had come highly recommended and we were not disappointed. The tasting room personnel were very friendly and the wines were generally very good, although some were a bit pricey. […]

As our road trip continued, we were excited to arrive back in our home state of Washington. We took two days to tour a select group of Walla Walla wineries. It was our first trip to Walla Walla in several years. Most Walla Walla wineries seem to be going to tasting fees that are refundable […]

As we continued our cross-country road trip, we stopped in Milton-Freewater, Oregon, at a couple of eastern Oregon wineries. What a contrast it was between the western Oregon wineries we have visited in the past and these two eastern Oregon wineries. We didn’t have to pay any tasting fees, the attitude of the winery tasting […]

As we traveled through Colorado, we made several stops at wineries near Palisade, Colorado. We were impressed that each of the wineries we visited sold only Colorado grown grapes, offered complimentary tastings, had nice professional tasting rooms, and their wines were pretty good. Our first stop was at Grande River Vineyards, Colorado’s oldest winery. Their […]

In recent weeks, we’ve reported from the road on winery visits in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Tennessee and Kentucky. Today, I’ll report on our wine tasting visits in Ohio, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Nebraska. On the way out of Cincinnati, Ohio, we stopped at Ohio’s oldest and largest winery, Meier’s Wine Cellars. It was almost […]

We recently had another one of our double-blind private tastings. All we knew when we sat down for dinner was that these two wines were red, but we did not know their region of origin or varietal. For a more complete description of how we set up these private tastings, please refer back to my […]