Life's a little sweeter with good wine
After considering the many options, we decided to take a day trip to Charlottesville, VA on Saturday (str8curv gets points for guessing it). Took us just over 2 hours to get there, and the end part of the drive was very scenic with the Blue Ridge mountains in sight. Since we got there around lunchtime, we went into the downtown area for lunch at an artsy cafe and then got really amazing gelato at Splendora's. We did a small amount of shopping and S excitedly bought a purse made of rainbow felted balls. With our stomachs full, we headed to Oakencroft winery. I think we tasted 9 wines and ended up buying 4 bottles: 2 "Countryside Reds" (1 as a gift to our neighbor for walking the dogs), 1 excellent Chardonnay, and a dessert wine tasting of peaches and apricots. We both went crazy over the dessert wine and decided to buy it to drink during our honeymoon. After walking around the vineyard a little, we decided to make our way to Skyline drive. It was almost 5pm at this point and unfortunately, we knew our daylight time was limited. We ended up stopping at Bearfence Rock overlook (mile 60ish on the Appalachian trail). There was a short hiking trail available, but it was very steep and rocky and we weren't wearing the shoes to do it. We hiked a little bit up to the worst rocky part and then turned back around. On the way down, we were within a few feet of 3 deer :) Since the sun was setting, we drove to The Oaks overlook and waited, but it was so cloudy that the sunset wasn't colorful at all so we left to head back home. Still, it had been a very nice daytrip.
On Sunday, we thought why not make a weekend of wine tasting, and drove an hour north to Hydes, MD to visit Boordy vineyard. Boordy was also having a fondue event; I had done it once before 4 years ago and I remember it being a lot better then. The fondues were more like velveeta, chocolate sauce, and caramel sauce than anything else this time, but at least we got some munchies. We tasted 11 wines there...I have to say I was not impressed with the reds which were all really dry, but the whites were quite good. S especially liked their port as well. After that, we made our way back home, stopping in Columbia for lunch at Donna's and a quick errand. Relaxed back at home and I unsuccessfully tried to get S to nap on the couch because she's caught whatever illness I and everyone else has had recently. So send her some healthy thoughts :)
Oakencroft vineyard
Ready to start growing in a couple months
Along Skyline drive, we spot these cool icicles on a rock
"Follow me" she says :)
We make it as far as we're gonna go on the trail
Some scenery at that point
One of the deer we spotted
At an overlook
At Boordy vineyard yesterday
On Sunday, we thought why not make a weekend of wine tasting, and drove an hour north to Hydes, MD to visit Boordy vineyard. Boordy was also having a fondue event; I had done it once before 4 years ago and I remember it being a lot better then. The fondues were more like velveeta, chocolate sauce, and caramel sauce than anything else this time, but at least we got some munchies. We tasted 11 wines there...I have to say I was not impressed with the reds which were all really dry, but the whites were quite good. S especially liked their port as well. After that, we made our way back home, stopping in Columbia for lunch at Donna's and a quick errand. Relaxed back at home and I unsuccessfully tried to get S to nap on the couch because she's caught whatever illness I and everyone else has had recently. So send her some healthy thoughts :)
Oakencroft vineyard
Ready to start growing in a couple months
Along Skyline drive, we spot these cool icicles on a rock
"Follow me" she says :)
We make it as far as we're gonna go on the trail
Some scenery at that point
One of the deer we spotted
At an overlook
At Boordy vineyard yesterday