Wine and warm weather
4,000 flock to tastings in Alexander, Dry Creek, Russian River valleys
Photos by KENT PORTER / The Press Democrat Julie Thompson of San Francisco samples wine Saturday at Terroirs Artisan Wines in Geyserville during the Winter Wineland event.
With temperatures Saturday around 70 degrees, Winter Wineland -- the ritual launch of local winemakers' calendar year -- felt more like an early summer romp through Wine Country.
About 4,000 wine enthusiasts were treated with blue skies and panoramas of sun-splashed green pastures, as they hopped from one wine tasting room to another in the Russian River, Alexander and Dry Creek valleys. The weekend event, now in its 17th year, has grown from 30 winemaking participants to 112 this year.
And yet, because it is only January, you won't see the traffic jams on narrow country roads that often plague spring and summer winetasting events.
"It's like a really great busy weekend but not crazy like Barrel Tasting," said Beth Costa, executive director of Wine Road Northern Sonoma County, the winery association that organizes Winter Wineland and the wildly popular Barrel Tasting event in March.
In Geyserville, Kerry Damskey and his wife, Daisy, both international wine consultants, used the event as a "coming out party" for their new winetasting room, Terroirs Artisan Wines.
The business, housed in a refurbished and earthquake-retrofitted brick building that was home to a saddlery in the 1800s and later a print shop, now showcases four limited-release, handcrafted wine brands made by Kerry Damskey.
Daisy Damskey said Winter Wineland is different from other winetasting events because it's held at a time -- between harvest and before pruning -- when winemakers can take a deep breath and contemplate the coming year.
"January is the time we can really be here for people who buy wine," said Damskey. She compared the last three months of the year, from harvest to December, to the hard work a new parent endures in a baby's first three months of life.
Almost a calm before the storm, Winter Wineland is as much a showcase of a winemaker's philosophy as it is of new wine releases.
On a gravel driveway along Westside Road, about eight miles southwest of downtown Healdsburg, Eric Hall and his business partners set up a makeshift tasting counter using a wooden plank atop upright wine barrels.
Although they weren't officially part of Winter Wineland, Hall and his partners poured samples of the kinds of micro-winery wines that will be featured at their tasting room, Roadhouse Winery. With remodeling at the property under way, Hall said he hopes to finish the project in time for spring's Barrel Tasting event.
About 40 people stopped by the wine tasting counter on their way to Russian River's established wine tasting rooms.
"It's really cool because people are really interested and we're not even here yet," said Hall.
Back in Geyserville, Rian Rinn, 29, of Healdsburg did his part to help his uncle, Pete Opatz, a winemaker who recently opened a wine room on Geyserville Avenue called Route 128.
Rinn, who works at Willowside Meats on Guerneville Road, paired Opatz's wines with gourmet sausage on a wafer-thin crostini.
"It's just food and sausage on a piece of bread," he said, after growing weary of naming all the special herbs and ingredients he used.
Opatz said he hopes his Route 128 vineyard and winery will bring more attention to the winemaking diversity along a road that stretches from Interstate 505 to the Pacific Ocean.
Winter Wineland continues today. Tickets are available at participating wineries for $30. A list of participants is available at wineroad.com.