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Originally Posted by JBR
I would like to take Mrs. JBR for a wine tour in BC for her birthday in August. I’m not a frequent wine drinker or aficionado by any means.
Looking for recommendations... Kelowna vs. Victoria. Specific tours or wineries. Somewhere we can also get a hike or two in over the weekend.
Thanks.
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What's Mrs. JBR's tolerance for wine and what is the stuff she likes? I find that when I go, I wine out at around 5-6 wineries and my wife is done around 4. Not completely sloshed or drunk, but not really able to differentiate flavors and stuff after that in a meaningful manner and not enjoying it as much. It might not be a bad idea to only choose 2-3 and take it easy at each location rather than blasting through as many as you can like a mad man. Also, don't forget to bring a cooler with ice to avoid damaging your wine in a hot vehicle by essentially boiling it. It's also not a huge problem to share a tasting with your wife. No need to get one each for the two of you. I'd definitely suggest bringing food to do a picnic at some of the different winery locations.
I'm a huge fan of the Naramata Bench. Most of them are pretty solid in their own way. If you're not high end connoisseurs, chasing wineries based on ability to take nice pictures isn't necessarily wrong either.
The following are kinda basic thoughts for wineries I went to in the Naramata Bench:
- 8th Generation. Mostly light and easy going wines there. Refreshing stuff for summer and it has outdoor tastings. Prices are reasonable for the wineries in the area. Their Rose and red stick out, but I like most of their stuff. I usually go here first. It's one of the first I'll pass on the way from Kelowna and it's a good baseline.
- Elephant island. You gotta go. It has wines made of all sorts of different fruit. From what I saw last time I was there, you can bring your own picnic/charcuterie and the winery would give you a guided tasting and recommend fruit wines that would pair well with the food you brought. No idea if this continues with the Covid situation. It did have an outdoor tasting area with kid toys IIRC. It was so good, my group of friends had quite a few that actually went more than once to try more things.
- Lake Breeze. I didn't really click with the majority of the wines they offered, but a bunch of friends liked it, so it might have just been me. The spice jar wine they offered really stuck out though. It was the only one that was actually interesting enough me and I purchased a bottle as a result. Plenty of outdoor area to try wines IIRC. My group ended up tasting underneath some tower.
- La Frenz/Bench 1775/Terravista. I was kinda wined out by this point, but I seem to recall these ones were light and sweet (which kinda turned bland and meh since I was kinda wined out and I'm also not a huge fan of super sweet). I did seem to recall I purchased a few bottles at these locations though, but I cannot recall the particular attributes of the winery wines.
- Serendipity. My wife and I love quite a few of the red wines here, but not everyone does. I find that the depth of flavour in their red wines is amazing, but some of my friends find it is too "busy". I always grab a bottle here. I'm generally only impressed by their reds though.
(We hit all these wineries in 1 day)
My buddy loves the Osoyoos and Oliver area wines. He's more of a wine buff than I and the stuff he brings over is quite nice.
When I went to wineries in the Victoria on my way to Tofino a little over a year ago, I thought they were OK. I'd say they're basically on par with quite a bit of the stuff in Kelowna which is mostly safe and typical stuff IMO. It's good, but it doesn't really stick out. vs some of the stuff in Osoyoos, Penticton, Naramata and Oliver can be kinda wild and strange in a good way.
There's also ciders and craft breweries in the area as well. If wine isn't your thing, you can also consider throwing one or two of these in between for you.