Wine Tasting 6.10.12

   Fifty miles west and south of here is Placerville  ( pronounced like glass).  Placerville was an important town during the gold rush of 1849.  Gold was to be found in the creeks and rivers of the area having been washed down from the surrounding rocks.

   The gold ran out, of course, and the miners moved to another place.  The town shrunk.  Today Placerville is fueled by tourist gold.   Highway 50 runs through it. People hurry by on their way to and from Lake Tahoe.  I hope they stop.

   Nearby, to the south is the Amador wine country, and area lower then Placerville but above the valley of Sacramento.  As one person put it, “This area is above the fog and below the snow.”  An area, it seems, that is perfect for growing grapes.  And going grapes is what happens here.  In this altitude zone of lots of small and large hills, there is a winery in every direction.  Neat fields of green stretch up and over each bump of land and many of the hilltops are locations of shady farms and wineries beckoning you to stop and sip.  And so we did.

    If you are in the area of Placerville and the small towns nearby such as Lincoln or Plymouth and you have a sunny afternoon to kill, do some winery exploring.  The scenery is excellent and most of the wineries do not charge for tasting.