The Day of Over-Indulgence

After spending a comfortable night with my cousins in their fifth wheel trailer, the four of us were off to visit some favorite wineries on the shores of Seneca Lake, one of the Finger Lakes of upstate New York.  If you've never tried New York wine, you don't know what you're missing!  To my taste buds it is Ambrosia, nectar of the Gods.

My first mistake of the day was not eating a hearty breakfast.  A bowl of cereal is not enough to begin a day of wine tasting.  Lesson learned!  The first winery we headed for was my cousin's favorite, Hazlitt 1852 Vineyards.  Since my cousin is a club member here we were all treated to a free tasting with very generous pours (at 10:00 in the morning).  Hazlitt has quite a selection of wines and most were quite palatable.  They are known for Red Cat, which is a sweet red made from the Red Catawba grape.  It was a little sweet for us, but we put a couple of bottles in our cart.  They also have White Stag, Niagara or White Cat, Gewutrzaminer, Pinot Gris, Chardonnay, Reisling (3 different ones), Cabernet Franc, Merlot, several fruit wines, and many more. We also liked the sparkling Gruvee. They are all excellent!  One of the best things was finding out that we could buy little plastic, screw-cap bottles of several of the wines.  These are just right for throwing in the cooler for a kayak trip or a picnic, and they can be refilled from the big bottle for another trip.  The atmosphere in this tasting room is light, happy, and relaxing with blues playing and a light breeze sifting in the open doors.  Hazlitt 1852 Vineyards is definitely one we'll go back to.

Next we stopped at The Hector Wine Company, one that we remembered from our last trip, and introduced my cousins to a winery they hadn't tried before.  We were greeted at the door by a very large, white, curly-haired dog named Luna, who escorted us into the big, open tasting room.  At a little after 10:30 AM, we were the only people there and the girl who poured our tastings took her time.  We had a leisurely tasting while we chatted about the area, the wines, and Luna, who stayed close by to take advantage of any hand that reached to pat her head.  Soul White is our favorite at Hector.  It's a semi-dry white that seems to go with anything.  We found another white called Lake Rat that we also liked. Then there's a Soul Red, Reisling, Pinot Blanc,  Essence, and a few more.  Again, they are all good and will please many different palates.

The next stop took us back to the sixties with tie-dyed, psychedelic T shirts and a hippie tasting room complete with incense and sixties rock and roll. Again we were met by the winery dog at the door, this one appeared to be a hound mix and was just as friendly and laid back as Luna.  The tasting room is also the gift shop and is rather crowded with merchandise, but still has a good feel to it.  I think the lady who poured our tastings was one of the original hippies and she was lots of fun.  The tastings were definitely not skimpy and were usually a full wine glass unless you stopped them mid-way.  Keep in mind that we've already had two generous tastings on very little breakfast.  This is about the time I started realizing I was headed for trouble.  Did that stop me?  Of course not!  I wanted to experience all the great wine I was finding! We really liked the Seyval Blanc, but I believe it was Uncle Homer's Red that did me in.  It's a very sweet red, and on top of all the previous wine it was a little too much!

Our next stop had to be lunch, so we headed for the Ginny Lee Cafe at Wagner Vineyards.  As soon as we were seated I excused myself and headed for the restroom.  Well, the rest is history and I won't bore you
with the details.  Our wine tasting day was cut short and I had a 3 hour
nap.

We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in the fifth wheel with my cousins and they made a wonderful dinner for us - water to drink, please!  It really was a beautiful day with just a little bump in the road. By they way, even if you don't want to visit wineries, the Finger Lakes are amazing just for the scenery and water falls.