Sometimes a layover at an airport is purgatory, but Chris Dymoke, our resident wine enthusiast, had eight hours to kill at Sacramento International Airport and found an excellent way to while away the time – touring the area vineyards.
Faced with eight hours at the airport, my travel companion and I decided the choice was either an unhealthy overdose of Starbucks and over-priced boutiques or a trip off-airport. Choosing the latter, we rented a car and headed for the Sacramento Delta, which looks more like Mississippi than California but is known for good wineries.
As a wine aficionado, I knew it was better to visit a winery on a full stomach so our first stop was at the Freeport Bar & Grill in the small town of Freeport, south of Sacramento. The hamburgers looked ever-so-tempting but I decided that a healthy salad with a tangy vinaigrette dressing would more than balance the wine to come later in the afternoon.
We then continued farther south to the winery hub of Clarksburg, where our first visit was to Bogle Vineyards. As this industry giant produces more than two million cases of wine a year, I expected an anonymous corporate factory; instead, I found a down-to-earth, family-owned business that still pays attention to individual customers. Although the actual wine-making has now moved to a different site, this is still a beautiful facility with first-class hospitality and excellent wines. Visitors shouldn’t be put off by the low price of some of Bogle’s wines; there’s lots of both quality and value… and the prices are excellent. In fact, although I have been lucky enough to visit many wineries, I don’t think I have ever drunk such good value wines as at this vineyard. I especially liked the Petite Sirah, which is $11 a bottle and widely available.
Miner’s Leap Winery is popular with lovers of Pinot Noir and Merlot
Claiming it is only 15 miles from downtown Sacramento, Clarksburg’s Old Sugar Mill is exactly what it used to be – an old sugar mill. However, it has now been transformed into a tasting Mecca for 11 wineries. Visiting them all would have been impossible, even for such a verified oenophile as I. However, we managed to fit in two quick visits.
The Heringer Estates, from which the winemaker’s grandfather made deliveries to the Old Sugar Mill when it was still a sugar mill, is a small, family-owned winery making about 5,000 cases a year. It produces an excellent Tannat, the national grape of Uruguay, which, although it is normally used for blending, is a strong and unusual varietal in its own right. The Clarksburg Wine Company, on the other hand, specializes in French varietals, only using grapes grown within this small micro-climate. The Viognier was very good, as were several of the reds.
The Heringer Estate’s Italian Teroldego (I hadn’t heard of it either!) is also very good – dark, full-bodied and an excellent companion for steak.
The final visit before heading back from Clarksburg to the airport was Miner’s Leap Winery, with its solid wines and cheerful, new tasting room, opened in March, 2016. We particularly liked the Pinot Noir and Merlot.
So, for only the price of a $50 rental car, we spent the most enjoyable layover sampling some excellent California wine, all within relatively close proximity to Sacramento’s international airport. Why don’t you do the same next time you face a long airport layover close to some quality wineries?
