Unicorn Winery: September 2010

This trip didn’t start out as a vineyard destination trip.  No, it was a thought but not the objective of our trek. It was early fall and Amy & I wanted to go hiking. Well, one thing led to another and we didn’t hit the road until after 2 in the afternoon so by the time we got out to Warrenton towards Shenandoah it was close to 4:00pm.  Since Adam and I had been hiking out that way a few weeks prior I knew we wouldn’t have enough time to hit the trails for a decent hike before sunset, and we saw bears at sunset. Anyways we saw some wineries and decided we had enough time to hit one. Unicorn Winery was the closest one so we popped in for a tasting. It was a cute, quaint winery with a small pond on the premises. The wines were decent and I tried my first ice wine. Ice wine you say? Yes, ice wine is made from the grapes that are still on the vine after the first frost and are picked post-frost. It makes a wine with “increased residual sugars” or a sweeter more dessert-like wine. Amy had encountered these before in Germany (I think), and was a big fan. They also had some wine slushies which were...interesting, not quite like a frozen sangria, a bit sweeter. 

We then got a short hike in on the grounds of the winery and may have wandered farther than we should have since we stumbled into a surveillance camera. Oh and our adventure didn’t stop there. We proceeded to stop at Wegman’s on the way back since everyone that lives in the ‘burbs raves about them. It was pretty huge and quite overwhelming to us city folk who are used to overstocked, compact grocery stores. They had about 3 restaurants in the place and I think we walked out with pizza by the slice. Overall a fun, random day. 

Vines all the way into the woods!

Does it get much better than a rural sunset?