Yadkin Valley Winery Tour + Harvest Host Tryout

Hi all -- Dianne here.

Just a reminder: The photos can be made larger for viewing by clicking on each one of them. Some of the landscaping in this blog is worth a click!

On our final day in Mount Airy, NC, Roger and I visited several wineries. The area, known as the Yadkin Valley Appellation, is developing as an area of dozens of wineries. Some of these are the result of former tobacco farmers switching to grapes as a crop.

We picked up a brochure outlining the various wineries in the area, and ruled out all but those offering dry wines that we prefer.

The first winery tasting room we visited was right in the middle of Mount Airy, the Old North State Winery. We didn't care for the reds, but we really liked some of their white wines. We left with a bottle of "Bare Bones Un-Oaked Chardonnay."

The next day we visited two wineries. The first one was about 25 miles south of Mount Airy. We were excited to see this winery, the Raffaldini Winery, as it was advertised as having Italian-type wines, which are our favorite.

The grounds were absolutely beautiful, and the setting did, indeed, remind us of our trip to Tuscany several years ago.

They have obviously taken great care in the landscaping and ambiance for their winery.

There were dozens of yellow rose bushes, all in full bloom.


My favorite wine is an Italian Chianti. I was very excited to try Raffaldini's Sangiovese; alas, though, even though I really wanted to like it, I just didn't care for it.

We again preferred their white wine selection, and came away with a Pinot Grigio and several fun items from the gift shop, including some Raffaldini spaghetti sauce, which is reportedly heavily spiked with wine. (I also got a new cap, retiring a red one that is now pink -- R.)

After the tastings, Roger also purchased a glass of white wine to enjoy on the lovely patio.

There is a large fountain and beautiful hilltop views. If there had not been as many hardwood trees, it really would have looked a lot like rural Italy!

I'm including a photo taken from our Tuscany vacation in 2004 to illustrate what I mean. This photo was taken from the villa

(a working winery) we stayed in with a group of friends who pooled resources to rent it. We've been hooked on Italian wine ever since!

The next winery we visited was the Shelton Winery, closer to Mount Airy.

Another beautifully landscaped winery! We thoroughly enjoyed walking around the grounds and taking it all in.

There were more beautiful roses planted in the Shelton Winery landscape. I also noticed rose bushes planted next to each row of grape vines in the field. Turns out, this is like a canary in a coal mine for the vintners; the rose bushes act as an early warning system for disease or insect infestation which might harm the grape vines.

The woman who did our tasting was delightful, and we really enjoyed ourselves.

We struck up a conversation with a couple tasting next to us; turns out, they were also traveling in the area in their RV. In fact, they were just passing through on their way north from Florida, and their RV was parked outside in the parking lot.

More "damage" was done at the gift shop (see final photo below). In addition, we also actually liked the Shelton Winery dry reds, so we came away with six very large bottles of Red Harvest table wine. We liked it just as well as their more expensive labels costing twice or three times as much, so we listened to our frugal inner voice and came away with the equivalent of 12 bottles @ $5.99/bottle.

Roger here... The two wineries that we visited poured not only wine for their visitors, but also poured big bucks into their facilities. The Raffaldini visitors' area

was an imposing Italian structure at the top of a hill. The Shelton Winery building was every bit as impressive. One of the friendly employees referred to it as the owner's hobby gone wild.

I'll let Roger fill you in on our overnight stay at the Rag Apple Lassie Winery, part of the new Harvest Host system.

Roger here... We recently joined an RV visitation club called Harvest Hosts (www.HarvestHosts.com). This new club has enlisted the cooperation of scores of wineries and working farms across the country. As members ($20/year), we are invited to park overnight for free (no hook-ups) in the winery parking lots. Since we knew that we would be spending next fall in California, visiting our older daughter, we thought it would be a good way to enjoy a little wine-tasting in a friendly atmosphere. Most of the original participating wineries are on the west coast, but many wineries across the entire country are now participating. It is a good deal for us, the membership pretty much paying for itself after one visit. It is also a great deal for the wineries due to the obvious purchases that are made.

While looking at the Harvest Hosts website, I noticed that one of the Yadkin Valley wineries, Rag Apple Lassie, was a participant, so I called to let them know we would be coming to spend our last night in North Carolina. We thought it would be fun, and it was.

Rag Apple Lassie

was named after the owner's grand prize-winning Holstein at the North Carolina State Fair. When the owner decided to convert many of his tobacco fields to other crops, including grapes, he decided to name the wine-making operation after the beloved cow of his youth. The company logo shows a black and white holstein cow sitting on a harvest moon while sipping a glass of wine - really pretty clever. All the cardboard cases and doors bear the black spots of a holstein on a white background. A modern metal sculpture of Rag Apple Lassie sipping a glass of wine while holding a wine bottle greets all the guests at the entrance to the winery.

The winery was voted as a finalist in the "Best New Winery in US" in 2007 by The Wine Appreciation Guild, San Francisco.

The building itself is unique. After passing a

silo, guests enter a metal building and find themselves on a catwalk overlooking the wine-making area below. Upon descending the stairs, guests can walk through the production area and into the gift shop/tasting room.

The person who greeted us and poured red wines for us to sample was the wife of the owner's son. She explained that this particular winery was not so much a hobby as part of a large family farm. (It was more of a working atmosphere than the upscale landscaped wineries we had visited earlier -- D.) We purchased three bottles of wine and then enjoyed a glass of Cabernet on the outside patio area in the shadow of

Pilot Mountain in the distance. We did like the Rag Apple Lassie dry reds: we purchased a bottle each of the cabernet, syrah, and red zinfandel. -- D.

I took the boys

on a walk along the outskirts of the vineyard

before we settled in for a quiet night among the landscaping.

Since we had no hook-ups and therefore no TV, it was a great night to read a book, listen to tree frogs, and relax.

I mentioned before that this was a good deal for the wineries - maybe a better deal than we intended it to be. Because of the beautiful atmosphere, we were tempted to purchase a few items in the gift shops - and that we did. We certainly did add to the local economy. Since we plan to utilize Harvest Hosts again when we get to California,

someone should notify the vineyards to stock up on their merchandise!

Stone Mountain State Park, Roaring Gap, North Carolina

Walking Wounded - Bad Map = Eight Mile Hike!!

Roger here...  It is my task to report our last hike at Stone Mountain State Park which was a doozy for a lot of reasons. 

 We left after an early lunch at 11:30 a.m.  (Good thing we ate.)  We decided that Chaplin had recovered enough from his minor injury to join us; after all, we would just be walking along a serene valley next to the mountain.  The map (worthless) indicated that the walk would be moderate (not strenuous, like the earlier trip to the summit) and we only intended to go about four miles (two miles each way to an old homestead and back).  As you probably surmise, there were surprises in store.

Our first surprise was the 200-foot waterfall that campers talked about, but was not on the map.  Wow, the water rolled right over the solid granite rock face, plummeting to a small pool below -  300 steps below.  300 wooden steps that we would need to climb as we returned at the end of the hike.  Oh well, we would only be walking four relatively flat miles.  The 300 return steps would be difficult, but we were up to it.

Chaplin was magnificent as we descended into the abyss. None of his usual fears surfaced. When we reached the bottom and were able to look back up at the amazing waterfall, we found our new friends, Steve and Evin and their three dogs, at the bottom - a great surprise. After a round of talk and picture taking we left our friends. 

We moved along the relatively flat valley along the babbling stream. So peaceful. So serene. "Oooh. Look out!," Dianne gasped, "Don't step on the salamander!"
 

 I have to tell you that I have never seen a living thing (without feathers) as red as that salamander was.  It stayed still long enough to get a picture; then we found another one a few feet away. We googled it when we got back and determined that they were rusty mud salamanders.  The dogs didn't even notice them.  Sight hounds, yeah right.

OK then.  We continued along the trail and the stream and saw some amazing views of the mountain that we had climbed earlier in the week -  glad we're not doing any climbing today, except for the 300 steps at the end.

After what was truly a pleasant walk, we eventually reached the half-way (not really) point of the hike.  We came upon the really interesting Hutchinson Homestead (something that was actually on the map).  It consisted of a series of well-preserved buildings that were constructed in the mid 1800's - a cabin, barn, outhouse, you get the picture.  We wandered around for a while looking at the informative placards.  The  homestead was located right at the base of the granite cliffs.  What a setting.


Time to move on.  I, CAREFULLY, looked at the map.  Instead of retracing our steps, we could take another moderate trail, with views of the Blue Ridge Mountains, that would only add a half a mile.  Dianne agreed that it would be more interesting (not entirely my fault), so we located the alternate trail and moved on, and up, and up, and UP!  (The map said nothing about going UP!).  

After innumerable switchbacks (and some minor complaining from Dianne) we reached the top. (Straight up is moderate?) We had magnificent views of the Blue Ridge Mountain escarpment on one side and Stone Mountain on the other - well worth the sweat. Really, it was. 


When we reached a fork in the trail (still at the top of the mountain we did not intend to climb), I carefully re-consulted the state park map. If we went right, we would supposedly travel across a ridge and add another half mile with the possibility of going down and then back up and then back down, and back up at the 300 steps. 


If we went left we would go down and be deposited half-way back to the campground on the level trail.  We were tired at this point, so we opted to go left.  Oh my gravy!  (My new favorite non-expletive from The Amazing Race.)

We arrived at another huge granite outcropping, walked across it, 

and began our descent.  At this point, I  must digress:  Way, way back 

at the waterfall, Dianne began telling me that an earlier injury of her big toe (right foot) was causing her some minor distress.  Several months ago (December), back when we were in Kansas, she had dropped the TV remote on it.  Much later, mid-March, the toe nail came off.  Since then it has been growing back and painted red so that it did not look gross.  Well, back at the waterfall, the toe started to hurt when it hit the front of her hiking shoe while going downhill.  Sooooo, now that we were going down a steep descent, she gave me her right shoe to carry  while she hiked with one bare foot.  Down we went.  At least we would be half-way home when we reached the bottom.

OH MY GRAVY!  We reached the bottom of the mountain, and we were BACK AT THE HOMESTEAD!  Oh my gravy.  I re-consulted the map and IT was wrong,  Oh my gravy.  We were still two and a half miles from the campground!  Dianne was barefoot (she ended up taking off both  shoes so as not to be UNEVEN), we still had the 300 steps to climb at the end, and the day was slipping away. 

 By the way, Chaplin was fine and thoroughly enjoying the day.   We stopped to eat the two apples that we brought along and gave the dogs a doggie treat.  We  retraced our steps back down the trail that we could have taken an hour ago.  

Soon after moving on, the trail changed from sandy gravel to granite gravel - so the shoes went back on (after two miles of barefoot hiking).  Ahh!  The 300 steps were every bit as fun as we thought they would be, especially after hiking 7+ miles!  Here are a couple photos of the infamous steps, from the bottom up and after we finally reached the top, looking down.


Back to the motor home - arrival time 3:30 -- four hours and, according to Dianne's pedometer, almost eight and a half miles!  The dogs slept.  Dianne reminded me what a good sport she is :-)  Hey, it was a good work out, wasn't it??


Dianne here:  "Good workout?!"  It took me two days to recover!!


If you'd like to follow the entire eight-mile hike with us (without all the exertion), I've put together another slide show of the photos we took along the way: