Our Row of Vines at Red Rooster Vineyard

Last weekend we had the opportunity to finally take advantage of our membership during the fall event of Red Rooster Winery‘s Adopt-a-Row program.  Adopt-a-Row allows you to adopt a row of vines in one of the Red Rooster vineyards on the Naramata Bench for a period of one year or more.  In return you get 12 bottles of wine (6 red and 6 white), a row labelled with your name, a certificate of membership which entitles to buy any gift shop items with 10% discount and a newsletter outlining news and events. It also gets you an invite to both a Spring and a Fall wine event held just for the members.

While we missed the spring pruning, learning and tasting experience we were sure to not miss out on the fall event.  Staying with some old and new friends at a beautiful B&B, the Serenata Guest House in Penticton, we took in all of the fall events.  Friday night featured a Members tasting and reception at the winery with live music, followed of course by our own tasting back at the guest house.  Saturday we arrived at Red Rooster for some instruction before 60 or so of us were sent out into the field to trim the vines of the very ripe and sweet Malbec grapes.  What a great experience.  It took about an hour for the group to pick one acre of the Malbec grapes which yielded about 3 tons and I would say everyone in the group loved the experience, we sure did!

After our hard work we were treated to another tasting with the wine maker as our host, everything from newly bottled to recently barreled to last years Malbec (before we were Members), followed by a lunch.  The total experience was fantastic and the Serenata Guest House did a great job with breakfast and the Absent Butler was fantastic, preparing and cooking our five course dinner served to the table at the Seranta Guest House with another of our own tastings from the weekend.

All in all a great experience – we can’t wait for next year!