Finding Common Ground Over A Glass

The differences between our members at our small Episcopal church has me thinking a lot lately. Our small church is extremely active in our community, and despite our many differences we function much like a large family.

It has dawned on me, our experiences at local wineries have likewise bought us closer to so many people of differing walks of life. You see over a glass of wine, we tend to find our similarities much more than our differences.

We met two of our very best friends at a North Carolina winery. Our partners in wine on many of our weekend winery escapades. Its easy to notice that we are very different from Will and Pam, yet every time we're together we always have the greatest of fun times. We love those guys! 

At our favorite local wineries, it's often many of the same locals hanging out. We have become friends with so many....and friendly acquaintances with others.

Some wineries will have local musicians playing and often small snacks available to enhance your experience.

The winery owners get to know their regulars, and often greet them with hugs. You see, most local wineries are small family owned businesses. They really appreciate their regular customers.

Not to mention the small batch craft wine!

All of this leads to a comfortable environment where people tend leave their differences at the door. A place where we all seem to be a little more tolerant, a little more open-minded, a little less demanding to get our own way. Where people naturally want to be social, naturally want to include and not exclude.

Just this past weekend we were visiting a favorite North Carolina winery and two young women were sitting near us by the fireplace. We struck up a conversation regarding the wine and food available and our conversations evolved including them as we all laughed the time away. 

We likewise experience this social phenomenon in our local wine bar, and at weddings, but yet not in our local coffee shop, or Wal-Mart! Our first notion is to lay it all on the wine. It must be the wine. Right?

John 2:1-11 - On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, "They have no wine." And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what concern of is that to you and to me? My hour is yet to come." His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you." Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to them, "Fill the jars with water." And they filled them up to the brim. He said to them, "Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward." So they took it. When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know from where it came from ( though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, "Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guest have become drunk.But you have kept the good wine until now." Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana if Galilee, and revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him. 

I'll speak to my interpretations of the above.

1. It's a wedding, this is a celebration of life.

2. Weddings are not rare, and at these weddings the people celebrate by drinking.

3. Jesus does NOT condemn the celebration of this wedding.

4. Though not His responsibility to do so, Jesus provides for the celebration.

The environment at your local winery, we believe often tends to mimic that of a wedding reception. There is wine, music, and happy smiling faces. The wine is only one factor of the whole environment. It's a celebration of life of which in turn leads us to fellowship.

Don't just take our word for it. Give our theory a try. Find your local winery on the The VinoWine App and join in on the celebration of life! 

Quick Reminiscing of 2018 and Looking Forward To 2019

2018 brought us many new experiences and of course several challenges. We rung in 2018 downtown Greenville, South Carolina....Yeah That Greenville!

The first few weekends took us to Morgan Ridge Vineyard and Brewhouse, Misty Creek Vineyard, Parker-Binns, and Baker Buffalo Creek Vineyard.

Valentines weekend took us to Charleston and Savannah. We enjoyed a visit to view the 400+ year old Angel Tree before making our way to Deep Water Vineyard.

March brought our anniversary and a visit to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. This trip offered us the opportunity to visit Sanctuary Vineyards in Jarvisburg plus a viewing of the oldest cultivated grape vine in the United States. The "MotherVine" located in Manteo is known to be 500+ years old. This scuppernong still produces grape today.

In May we hosted the inaugural Palmetto Wine Competition at the historic Belmont Inn in Abbeville. We're proud of the event and thankful for the opportunity to promote the South Carolina wine industry.

The summer months brought visits to the Yadkin Valley, Upper Hiwassee Highlands, Eastern Tennessee, and to many of our local favorites.

October we were blessed with a visit to Highlands, North Carolina and a stay at The Old Edwards Inn. We were lucky to have the Sommelier give us a tour of the wine cellars.

Christmas brought us another opportunity to visit Charleston where we experienced a gorgeous Christmas Eve sunset on the beach at Isle of Palms!

Yes, this post skips right by so many fun times and visits to so many awesome places. Our resolution is to better promote all of the amazing small businesses and destinations for which we are fortunate to visit. We remain thankful for our family and friends, and for your continued support of our blogs Winery Escapades and Our Wine Tonight.

Here's to a healthy, prosperous, and happy 2019.

Cheers!

Jenni and Dennis

2018 Weekends 2 & 3

We got sort of a late start Saturday (1/13) due to some errands we had to take care of before we could go. We met some dear friends, Pam & Will, at Misty Creek Vineyard in Mocksville, NC. We were greeted by Bear and Merl (Barry said someone else named him for them, it's Merl as in Merlot) when we arrived, as well as the owner, Barry, his lovely wife and his mother. Since it had been a while since we had been there and Pam & Will had not been there, Dennis & I did the tasting with them. They have several lovely wines. Our favorite is still the 2008 Chambourcin. The 4 of us split a bottle of the Syrah and also the Traminette. We brought a bottle of the Misty Rose, Syrah and the Chambourcin home. We enjoyed a hour or so hanging out in front of the fire with Pam & Will and also have nice conversations with Barry. We left there and headed to dinner at Port City Club in Cornelius. Man was the food good! We look forward to going back in the spring so we can enjoy the outside seating by the lake.

Merl

Will & Bear

Sunday (1/14) we went to Lake James Cellars. For Dennis & I this place is the best of both worlds! It's a winery but is also and antique store. So you can do a tasting, figure out what your favorite wine was and then browse in the antique store with your glass of wine. We brought a bottle of the Fonta Flora Cranberry Blush home. 

After leaving Lake James, we headed to Wood Mill Winery. This winery is primarily muscadine, but they also have some fruit wines. They have semi-dry, semi-sweet and sweet variations of the majority of their wines. This winery is a beautiful location for events. They have a lovely outside space (which we did not get to enjoy as it was WAY to COLD!) and their inside space is also great and has terrific views. We brought a couple of bottle home from here as well. We got a chance to speak with the owner/wine maker Larry. The young lady who handled our tasting was also very sweet and quite knowledgeable. 

This past Saturday (1/20) we met some fellow bloggers and friends at Cats Paw Winery in Rock Hill. Dennis and I have been here a few times before and it's always such fun. You have a complimentary never ending bowl of popcorn to enjoy with your tasting and afterwards as well as bottled water. For Bob & Jennifer (Wine Carolinas) it was their first trip. We had a nice visit with them as we sipped wine and chatted. Dennis and I shared a bottle of the Strawberry Sensation and brought a bottle of the Purr-Fectly Peach and his latest port home. We said good-bye to our friends and debated about what to do next. We ended up going further into Rock Hill and having dinner at The White Horse Restaurant. This has been one of my favorite restaurants since my time living in Rock Hill. As we were sitting down, I heard someone call my name.... it was so friends who still live there! It was so great to see Rebecca & Darryl. After dinner we headed on home as it was getting late. 

Sunday after church and lunch we decided to ride up to Parker-Binns Vineyard. As always Dee waited on us and was her terrific self! Karen and Roberto are on a much deserved vacation! The vineyard was in the excellent care of Kelly, their daughter, Dee and the wine maker Justin. They are currently out of the Rose that Dennis & I usually share so we had a bottle of the Petit Manseng and met some really great couples. The weather was perfect as well. While sitting outside enjoying pizza, wine and live music, we also got to meet their winemaker - Justin Taylor. Justin told us that they are soon to be bottling some wine. Some that will be new to us and some that are old favorites (yes some Rose is coming!). We learned that Justin studied at Surry and previously worked at Burnshirt Vineyards (also a favorite!). 

We finished our wine and decided to make one more stop at Russian Chapel Hills Winery to see Andre. It was close to closing time but we were able to enjoy a glass each of his Malbec on the covered porch. The view was spectacular! 

 

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Winery Escapade Weekend #50

Well this weekend due to a family event we decided to keep it local. All the wineries we visited we have written a blog about in the past. With that being said, here's what we did this weekend. 

After the family Christmas get together at my Aunt's house, we headed over to City Scape Winery. We each had a glass, I had the Green Apple Gewürztraminer and Dennis had Müller Two-Goats. We also brought a bottle of the Winemaker's Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon home. 

We then headed to Mountain Brook Vineyards for a little Christmas Caroling. We enjoyed a bottle of the Rambunctious Rosé while singing carols with Brin & Mir. For this vocalist who isn’t getting a lot of performance time these days, this was a lot of fun. Also, while we were there, Ruah was grazing in the vines. We also saw some deer beside the driveway but due to it being overcast, the deer were blending into the woods to much for me to get a good picture. 

From there we stopped to grab something for dinner and then we headed to Old Rock Quarry Winery. As always, the wine and the company was wonderful. Had a nice visit with Debbie, Lindy and Linda. We brought a bottle of the Snap Apple Sassy and a bottle of the Strawberry Kisses home with us.

Sunday morning we went to church and then we finally took some time to do a little bit of Christmas decorating. Better late than never, right? After doing that we decided it was time to go to Biltmore for a little bit as we bought season passes and hadn’t used them yet. While on the way we decided that it had been way to long since we had been to Burntshirt Vineyards, so we made a little detour. We each had a glass of their Apple Wine and brought a bottle home. 

We then made our way to Biltmore Winery and decided to do a tasting again. MaryAnn was our server and she was very knowledgeable as well as very friendly. We met a sweet cute couple who were also doing a tasting at the same time. She apparently likes wine more than he does, but he was a good sport and was trying to learn more about it. We brought both the Christmas White and the Christmas Red, (signed by the label artist – he was there signing bottles – happy coincidence for us!)  home with us as well as a bottle of the 2016 Limited Release Chenin Blanc. After the tasting we went over to the wine bar and shared a charcuterie and cheese board as well as a bottle of Zinfandel Blanc de Noir. 

We drove around the property for a little bit & then headed to see the lights at the Christmas House in Inman, SC. When it comes to Christmas light displays, I swear we are like 2 little kids. We drove through 3 times!

Sadly after that is was time to go home & prepare for this work week. Until next weekend we wish you all a Merry Christmas and as always, good wine!

Think Local: Discover Local Wineries and Purchase Their Wines in the VinoWine App

As the creators of VinoWine, we’re honored and thrilled to have been asked to write as guest bloggers on Winery Escapades! Dennis recently reached out to us asking if we could outline some of VinoWine’s app features and share how we got started on this venture. We were very humbled to learn that Dennis and his wife Jenni use the VinoWine app to discover and track nearby wineries and we hope that, as you learn more about us, you will as well!

When it comes to VinoWine there's really something for everybody. You can discover nearby wineries, keep track of the ones you've visited, see which wineries are having events around you, and track the upcoming wine festivals that will be in your area.
     
In addition to being a winery finder, we're proud to announce that we just launched our newest feature; the VinoWine Marketplace. VinoWine now gives small to medium sized wineries the ability to advertise and sell their wine directly to our users. We created the marketplace so wine lovers can discover and purchase those hard to find wines which are made from wineries who don’t distribute them. Many of you will be happy to hear that as of last week, we just started shipping wines to fifteen different states which include North Carolina, one of Dennis and Jenni's frequented areas! With every passing month, we add more wineries and their wines for sale, allowing us to build a diverse marketplace capable of meeting any wine lover’s needs.

So here’s a little about us. Our names are Mike Barefoot (no relation to the wine) and Mike Lawler. We’re commonly known as “the Mikes.” Both of us are military veterans (Marine Corps and Army infantrymen) who decided to switch career paths from defense contracting to being our own bosses. In late 2009, we met each other while working for a tech company in Northern Virginia doing geo-spatial work (mapping out people and places). Within a few years of us meeting there was a need for both of us to regularly fly over to London, England to conduct business alongside our two bosses. At the end of each day we felt it necessary to explore and soak up the local history and culture that surrounded us. We found all those things at the local pubs. When word of the upcoming 2012 London Olympics reached us, an idea dawned on VinoWine's CEO, Mike Lawler. Being the head of technology for our company, specifically focusing on geo-spatial mapping, it was a no-brainer for him; we were going to create an app that located every London pub that surrounded the Olympic stadiums. Within a short amount of time, we created an app that allowed people from any country to “check in” to any pub within the app, showing other users which countries were represented at these pubs. We lovingly gave the app the name, BRU. Following the Olympics, we were then asked by friends to create a similar app that provided locational information on all wineries in the commonwealth of Virginia. We both liked the idea so we sat down and planned out how we wanted the app to look and function. Over time, that idea spawned the beginnings of the VinoWine app and today we now cover the entire U.S. We loved the idea of getting out of the confines of our brick-and-mortar office and working with folks who, like us, are passionate about wine and getting their wines into the homes of consumers. Needless to say, it’s thirty work.

What originally started as a hobby for us in our spare time quickly became a fulltime job. Since our founding, we’ve been tirelessly working on partnering with wineries across the U.S. getting them to add their upcoming events and wine lists into our app for our users to view and rate. We developed interactive tasting menus that allow our users to rate the wines as they taste them at the wineries. That way you’ll always remember where you were and what you liked. As our partnerships with wineries grew we then decided to have our app and website also feature a direct-to-consumer marketplace so we could sell wines that are hard to locate and purchase. With VinoWine, every winery and vineyard that can ship to consumers can now advertise and sell their wines directly to our users like never before.

You might be amazed at this fact because we sure were: 60% of U.S. wineries don’t distribute their wine! The reason; they just can’t afford it. So this means you won’t find their wines sold in grocery stores or readily available online. Knowing that, we decided to partner with local wineries and create a marketplace that allows them to sell their wine to people like all of us. In the end, we not only wanted to create an awesome app and website that helps everyone enjoy the sophistication of wine tasting, we also wanted to give our users a customer service experience that feels more like a friendship than a business.

We gotta say, the best part of our job (other than tasting a LOT of great wines) is meeting or emailing back and forth with the people who use VinoWine. We receive emails every day from our users that inform us of wineries that have either opened or closed, helping us keep our interactive winery map up-to-date. We love to email everyone back to thank them and from there a dialogue or two will begin. We feel very strongly that every one of our users or social media followers is also a part of our company and we strive to make everyone as happy as we can by providing the best service possible.

The VinoWine app is available for download on iOS and Android devices (Wine sales coming soon to Android devices). We invite you to learn more about what we do by checking out our website, or even better, downloading the VinoWine app and trying it for yourself! We’re selling some really great wines from wineries across Virginia and in the month of October we’ll be opening up our marketplace to the rest of the country’s wineries. Feel free to shoot us an email with any questions or just to say hello!

Mike and Mike

Co-founders of VinoWine

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