Lake Tahoe

In article , snipped-for-privacy@bright.net says...

Cedarville is probably my favorite. They sell most of their wine through wine clubs, so visiting might be the only way you'll try it. You have to call and make a reservation. In El Dorado County.

Three vineyards close to each other have gotten together to form the El Do Rhone growing area. Sierra Vista, which makes my favorite viognier (very American), Holly's Hill and the newbie, Narrow Gate. The founder of Sierra Vista is a founding member of the Rhone Rangers. In El Dorado County. I believe all three are open every day. Sierra Vista is for sure. No appointment necessary. Max of this newsgroup knows Bill Easton of Easton Wines, which also operates Terre Rouge Winss. I Love Easton's Zinfandel. It's in Amador County, which is getting a bit out of the way. Back in El Dorado County, Boeger Winery in Apple Hill has good wines and probably the best tasting room I've ever been in. It's an old wine cellar. They were building a new, larger one. Hopefully the cellar is still available. The Apple Hill area, which is kind of a tourist trap of small farms selling produce and fresh baked goods, has several wineries. Also in Apple Hill, I like Madrona Vineyards There's a couple others but I'm forgetting them. Apple Hill is just north of U.S. 50. El Do Rhone would be about 10 minutes south of U.S.

1. Cedarville is a few minutes south of El Do Rhone, if I remember correctly.

If you're in north shore, see my post of about two weeks ago in this newsgrouop about my tasting trip to Grass Valley and Nevada City.

Before getting too in depth, is this a plan for a day trip or an overnight? If you want to do a day trip, keep in mind that from South Lake Tahoe, El Dorado wineries are over 60 miles away and Amador County wineries are about 100 mi away. Since much of the travel will be done on CA Hwy 49 through the foothills, don't expect to go faster than 60 MPH either... If (God forbid) you're starting from Truckee, add another

50 miles onto your journey -- and that's one way. The bottom line: El Dorado is doable as a day trip, but forget about Amador county unless you're willing to put in 5+ hours of driving. If OTOH you plan on spending a night or two there, both areas are easily accessible.

Sierra Vista is the only El Dorado winery I've visited. It's well worth a visit.

Easton/Terre Rouge is a great place to visit. Other good stops in Amador are Karly, Amador Foothill, Vino Noceto and Renwood/Santino.

My recommended travel route is to start on 49 at Placerville (take US 50 from South Lake Tahoe) or Auburn (take I-80 from Truckee). FWIW, there's great touristic opportunities in Gold Country aside from wine tasting, too.

Mark Lipton

Mark Lipton raises a valid point I overlooked. I'm assuming you know that it is a drive of some length from the south shore of Lake Tahoe to El Dorado County wineries. I think Amador County and El Dorado counties are both doable because I did it myself one time driving from Reno, which is a lot further away than South Lake Tahoe. YOu can't do every winery, but you can do several. I ran the mileage from South Lake Tahoe to Plymouth, which is on the southwestern side of most Amador county wineries, in both Expedia and Yahoo map and the stimated driving time varied from 2 hours and 12 minutes in Yahoo to 95 minutes in Expedia. I suspect Yahoo is probably closer to the actual driving time. I don't know how many wineries you want to visit, but both areas are doable because you can visit Amador County wineries, then go to southern El Dorado County wineries in the Fair Play area (Cedarville and others) and then go to the wineries in Pleasent Valley (like Sierra Vista) and then maybe go into Apple Hill if there's time left. Take a look at this Amador County winery map:

By the time you reach Mount Aukum, you're in southern El Dorado County. Shenandoah Road turns into Aukum Road, which takes you through the Fair Play wineries and into Pleasant Valley. From Pleasant VAlley it's a realitivy straight shot up to the Camino area of U.S. 50, which is the east end of Apple Hill. So if you started out about 8 a.m., you would reach your first Amador County winery shortly after 10 a.m. and could drink your way back to U.S. 50 and the drive back to South Lake Tahoe. All in one day. It's not clear when you're doing this but if it's in the fall, here's an added bonus: YOu'll thank me for the recommendation because the drive up Shenandoah and Aukum roads is gorgeous. I made note of this last October when I did this because the previous June I had gone to Napa Valley and go stuck in a huge traffic jam trying to reach I-80. A few more Amador County wineries to toss out are Montevina and Sobon Estate. As I drank wine I bought on my trip to Amador County I kept being surprised how good were the three Montevina varieties I bought. Nothing that Robert Parker is going to rate as a 100, but good wine none the less. I picked up a bottle of their pinot grigio this year in my neverending quest for unaoked whites. I still don't like pinot grigio, but it was probably one of the better pinot grigios I had and was less than $10. Sobon Estate has a couple of Rhones I liked. They also have a free museum that's worth the 10 to 15 minutes it takes to walk through it. They include some huge wine casks that well-known winemakers used until about 30 years ago to make wine which they sold to people who brought their own gallon jugs. There's also early winemaking tools for the area.

Whether it's doable depends on how willing the person is to drive a fair distance after having visited several wineries. I've given enough advice to visitors to NoCal about visiting wine country to know that many people quail at even driving 50 mi on 101 back from the Sonoma valley after a day of wine tasting. Driving 49 at night is another kettle of fish altogether, hence my warning. I'd do it (but I spit) and you'd do it, but many people -- especially visitors to CA -- won't.

So much depends on weather and traffic that it's hard to estimate. Under the best conditions, the Expedia time might be possible, but in the real world, 2 hours is closer to the mark IMO. It also depends on how comfortable the driver is with two lane "mountain" roads: I've seen tourists creep along 49 almost as badly as they do on Hwy 1. And God help you if you get stuck behind an RV from Kansas ;-)

Your advice is excellent, though, Steve, and I'll take note of it for my next visit, too.

Mark Lipton