On the Wine Trail
The Finger Lakes area was designated in 2018 as the best wine growing area in the U.S. That is probably surprising to those who have only thought about Napa and Sonoma as holding that honor, but there are lots of reasons that the area has become such a winery-rich area. At last count there are over 120 wineries in the finger Lakes, nestled amongst the eleven Finger Lakes (Canadice, Canandaigua, Cayuga, Conesus, Hemlock, Honeoye, Keuka, Otisco, Owasco, Seneca and Skaneateles). That reminds me of the joke about the guy who has twelve fingers and seven on one hand…. Simply stated, people are surprised there are so many Finger Lakes and always assume there are just five. I, myself, just told someone yesterday that I thought there were seven, but no, there are technically eleven in this area of glacial moraine lakes formed when the last Ice Age receded north. The biggest two are Seneca and Cayuga, both over fifty miles long and positioned to run north/south. The land between the lakes has proven to be ideal for grape growing for several reasons. To begin with the lakes collectively cause the snow belts for the region to be both north of here and south of here. The warmer waters of the lakes causes the fifty mile swath in between to be relatively moderate in weather even if a cold winter day seems to belie that. But grapes like the more temperate climate and they also appreciate the drainage that occurs due to the geological structure of the gorges and waterways that tend to run East/West and drain into the lakes, causing there to be a number of lovely waterfalls all among these lakes.
The favored t-shirt says that Ithaca is Gorges, which is an obvious play on words, but is also very true. That gives rise to the second reason why the are makes for so many great wineries. It has been a summer playground for several centuries and many of the large old homes in the surrounding towns, many of which bear witness to the early Greek settlers by carrying a wide variety of Greek names, are there because the rich and famous of their day and before air conditioning thought it a mild and lovely area to summer. In other words, this area draws many tourists and people of means to it and thus, gives the wineries a natural flow of customers who congregate to practice their oenophile preferences by going from one winery to another for tastings. Wine tours are a very popular activity in these parts and people come from far and wide to partake of the varietals.
Among our Independence Day gang of visitors we have a goodly array of wine lovers who could think of nothing more pleasant than to spend a day on the wine trail. While there are so many choices in wineries, in general the area between Lakes Seneca and Cayuga is probably the best known and most popular. So, the decision was taken, spearheaded by Matthew and Phillip, our friends from New York City and, in the case of Matthew, Kim’s “theater husband”. Kim and Matthew met doing summer stock in Vermont back in the 80’s and have remained fast friends ever since. They decided at the time if that they were both single in later life that they would join hands, but luckily for me, Matthew is gay and he found Phillip along the way and Kim found me. So, when Matthew and Phillip said they wanted to go winery hopping, I agreed to chauffeur them since I had no other more pressing plans. Phillip researched the best wineries and we set a plan that would begin with a visit to the Watkins Glen park and falls. Pete, Nancy and their tribe would join along the way, as would son Thomas and Jenna.
I picked Matthew and Phillip up at their hotel (Phillip is a big-wig at Hilton, having been with both Four Seasons and Mandarin Oriental and knows all the best hotels). We went straight to the upper part of the Watkins Glen State Park and I chose to drop the two off to walk down the gorge trail since walking down and then up the 800 steps made my knees ache just thinking about it. After picking them up at the bottom of the gorge, we headed off to the Damiani Vineyard for the first tasting. While they got themselves an array of local whites and reds to test, I found the Mexican Taco Truck and had my lunch of very authentic fare, with mole sauce on top. It was a sunny perfect Finger Lakes day as we overlooked the impressive Seneca Lake vista. Eventually Pete and Nancy a long with their oldest son Pete Jr. and his girlfriend Jackie, as well as Nancy’s sister Liz showed up with two dogs. Wineries are dog-friendly places and good thing since shortly thereafter Thomas and Jenna showed up with their pooch, Hank. They had come from the foam out Ithaca Farmer’s Market where everyone in Ithaca seems to go on a weekend morning to practice their random open-field parking skills.
We were scheduled to go to the nearby Lafayette Vineyard next, but skipped it due to the lateness of the hour and opted to drive north to Lodi, where we found Lamoroux Landing, a specialty vineyard that produces award-winning Riesling’s. While I sipped my root beer, the rest of the crowd put down a few more tastings before toddling back towards Ithaca for our evening barbecue. I spent my day doing this designated driver program because I love the Finger Lakes area and knew it would be a lovely day for a drive through pretty countryside and because I did not want Matthew and Phillip to have to juggle the issue of whether they should have one tasting more or less based on their driving capacity.
I had my first taste of alcohol when I was fourteen and heading over to live in Rome on the Italian Line’s star liner, the SS Michelangelo. It was a very eye-ping week for me in 1968. I learned about life on an ocean liner, life in the relaxed European attitude towards things like alcohol consumption and the life of freedom, running around the ship with a gang of like-destined kids heading back to school in one or another of the American schools in Rome. My first drink was a Manhattan, which I had as we left the dock in Manhattan. Why a Manhattan? Because it seemed like a cool drink that was more manageable than a Martini. That was drunk under the watchful eye and supervision of my mother, who was quite open-minded for the day. After that, I can’t remember specifically, but am pretty sure I tasted my fair share of wine on board over the ensuing week. By the time we landed in Naples, I had been cured of my alcohol curiosity and I had determined that I didn’t really care for wine or alcohol. For most people, that adolescent reaction fades during the college years, and since the drinking age back then was only eighteen, I had ample opportunity to regain a taste for wine, but it didn’t happen.
Over the years, I have certainly had more than a few glasses of wine, both red and white, and cannot say that my opinion of the drink has changed. I am quite indifferent to it and chose long ago to have the social bravery to just say I don’t drink wine or alcohol. That is what makes me a natural designated driver and while I enjoyed the wine trail yesterday, I did so without ever having a drop of wine touch my lips.