Little Devil's Stairs/Glen Manor

We've seen more bears this year than ever; we seem to have a bumper crop and I'm starting to worry about bear-human conflict. We all know the bears won't win. Sunday was no exception; as we drove down Keyser Run road about a mile before the Little Devil's Stairs trailhead, we saw a big black bear galloping down the middle of the road in front of us for about 25 yards before going crashing into the woods next to Keyser Run.

The sun wasn't up terribly high by the time we hit the trailhead at 8:30 and the woods were even darker, especially up in the canyon that is Little Devil's Stairs. Taking photographs in this dim light was a non-starter and so there are no photographs of the canyon itself or of Keyser Run coming down through it, which is a shame because it is ruggedly beautiful.

The first half a mile from the trailhead and parking lot was an easy walk through the woods. From there, the trail climbed a thousand feet over the next mile. Trekking poles were of no use going up and Ann stowed hers. The trail, as it meandered back and forth across the stream between the canyon walls, required handholds in a few places. It took me a little while to get used to climbing with my pack on. I'm not terribly used to the altered center of gravity which is not noticeable on most hikes.

From the top of the stairs, we continued the gentle climb to the Fourway intersection with the Keyser Run fire road and continued across on the Piney Branch trail, staying to the left at each trail intersection making a big counterclockwise loop that ultimately saw us rejoin the fire road at the Bolen Cemetery, a reminder of the hardscrabble life that people led up in the hollows before Shenandoah National Park was assembled in the 1930s.

Bolen Cemetery: Life Before SNP

After gaining a thousand feet in a mile, we spent the next five miles giving all that elevation up going gently downhill along the Piney River or Piney Branch. We took a break for lunch (goat cheese, arugula, sun-dried tomato pesto, and chorizo wraps along with a couple handfuls of blueberries) just at the point where the trail crosses to the opposite bank of the creek, shortly before recrossing the creek for a quick climb up to the cemetery and a final mile of fire road down to the parking lot. The hiking sites say we did just over nine miles; our GPS said 8.5. I tend to believe the GPS; the hike didn't feel all that long.

Cooling off in Piney Branch

Hiker Lunch: Goat Cheese, Arugula, Sun-Dried Tomato, and Chorizo Wraps

Here and there through the woods, I found patches of sunshine (and flowers making use of that sunshine) for photos. Many of the following photos are iffy, the lack of light and lack of a tripod being what they are. We walked through large patches of White Bergamot, Monarda clinopdia, but I could never get the camera to focus on the very airy bloom heads in the dappled light. Ditto for the off-white bloom spikes of American Wintergreen, Pyrola americana. We were both surprised to come upon a patch of Squawroot still in bloom. In my book, it's a late spring flower, not a mid-summer one.

There were lots of Doll's-Eyes in various stages of ripening, but only one that had fully turned white and that was in a little glimmer of sunlight. Too bad they are poisonous.

Actea pachypoda (Doll's-Eyes or White Baneberry)

White Sweet Clover, Melilotus albus, Surprising in the Woods

The pale touch-me-nots have just started blooming along the stairs but in a couple of weeks, the stairs should be awash in golden blossoms. This is probably the most common plant along the moist part of the trail and at times, we had to wade through them so tight were they packed alongside the narrow trail.

Pale Touch-me-not, Impatiens pallida, All over the Stairs

For the past several hikes, I have seen lots of Geums in the woods and none in enough light to photograph. This one is missing a petal and the white bloom is blown out from overexposure in the dim light.

A Geum, probably virginianum, Missing a Petal

A Beautiful Heal-All

Moth Feeding on a Heal-All

Meadow Rue in Full Bloom

Possibly Common Nipplewort, Lapsana communis

I am surprised that this is the first and only Columbine that I have seen in bloom this year. I must be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Columbine, Aquilegia canadensis

Fly Poison, Amianthium muscaetoxicum, a Lily

Indian Pipe

Also Indian Pipe??

For weeks, I have been trying to get a decent photo of long-leaved bluets, which are often found trailside in the woods. The light is too low and the blooms are too small. This is the best of dozens and dozens of frames.

Long-Leaved Bluet, Houstonia longifolia

Very Few Roses Still in Bloom

We had yet to encounter any Purple Flowering Raspberries this year but all along this trail we found them almost everywhere there was a little clearing. They are a most beautiful and spineless raspberry, but sadly the fruit isn't all that good to eat.

Purple Flowering Raspberries, Rubus odoratus, Everywhere

Black Cohosh Along the Fire Road

I thought these maidenhair ferns were beautiful. Though I don't pay too much attention to the ferns growing alongside the trail, I don't recall seeing maidenhairs elsewhere.

Northern Maidenhair Fern, Adiantum pedatum

After our hike as we were heading back in to Front Royal up and over Chester Gap, Ann wondered aloud if we could go to see Jeff and Kelly. I mentioned that we were on the wrong side of the mountain, but cut across to the west side as soon as we got to the foot of the mountain in Front Royal. Soon enough, we were pulling up to a full parking lot and a jam packed tasting room. It's always good to see them busy.

Enjoying a Well-Earned Sauvignon Blanc

It seems that I knew pretty much all of the guests in the tasting room and being grubby and tired after a hike, I just wanted to get a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc and head outside under the shade of an umbrella. So I just kind of bypassed a whole lot of line, gave Kelly a hug, and asked her if she would grab me a bottle of SB. And with that, we went outside to drink our wine, rest, and wait for things to die down so that we could socialize a bit.

Kelly invited us to stay for the staff blind tasting afterwards. Once all the guests had left, we all gathered on the back patio and tasting four blind wines. Had I known that this was going to happen, I would have brought a bottle along. We tasted a Virginia Rkatsiteli, a Willamette Pinot, a Piemontese Barbera, and a California Petit Sirah. Begrudgingly, we had to leave around 7:45 and got back to the house just before hiker midnight, 9pm. After a shower, that was all she wrote for Ann. Too much fun made her a sleepy girl!

Dickey Ridge/Glen Manor Vineyards

The forecast for Sunday was miserable—80% chance of thunderstorms all day—yet by 10:00am none of these storms had materialized, though it had rained during the night and sprinkled at times through the early morning. We finally decided, late though it was, to risk the weather and take a brief hike. Ann decided we should go to the Dickey Ridge Visitor's Center in Shenandoah National Park and walk the trails originating there. We scrambled to put together some lunch and refill our water bottles, upsetting the poor brown dog.

"You're Leaving Me Again. I Just Know It."

Two trails originate directly across the Skyline Drive from the Dickey Ridge Visitor's Center, the Fox Hollow Trail and the Snead Farm Loop, both of which join the Dickey Ridge Trail and run concurrently with it in places. We intended to take the longer Snead Farm Loop first and then do the Fox Hollow Trail or move to some other nearby location for another hike. After a chance meeting with a young ranger at the trailhead, because of an encounter that he just had with a somewhat aggressive bear on the Snead Farm trail, he suggested that we go straight down the hill and not to the right. We didn't know at the time that he had directed us down the Fox Hollow Trail but it quickly became obvious as we continued to bend north on the trail and not south as we had planned.

I can report that the very easy Fox Hollow Trail is really not worth hiking. Given the rainy conditions (it sprinkled a little bit during our walk), we found the trail very slippery. And aside from this toad, there really wasn't much to see other than the small Fox family graveyard. Given the low altitude (right around 2000 feet) and the full leaf canopy, nothing was in bloom on this trail.

Ann's Quick Eyes Spotted This Toad

We made the quick loop back around to the Visitor's Center and then bore right onto the Snead Farm loop. After a half a mile or so, it opened onto a fire road and there were a lot more flowers in bloom along this road.

A Tiny Geranium

Ox-Eye Daisies Are in Full Bloom Now

White Campion Was Everywhere Sunny

Red Clover is Found in Small Patches

Just a Few Roses Still in Bloom

A Particularly Handsome Prostrate Ranunculus

After reaching the fire road, we quickly came upon the Snead Barn, which was abandoned in the 1950s. There's nothing particularly photogenic about it, but apparently Black Vultures are nesting in the second floor. One dove out a window as we approached the barn and landed a few feet away. I could hear more commotion inside.

Cooling Off in a Creek at Snead's Barn

Black Vulture Nesting in the Barn

At the barn where the road ended, we headed back into the woods on a trail which started to climb a bit and the trailside fauna changed as we headed up.

A Penstemon, Don't Ask Me Which

Asclepias quadrifolia, Fourleaf Milkweed

Euphorbia pubentissima, False Flowering Spurge

As we neared the highpoint of Dickey Ridge, a brief opening in the trail afforded us a beautiful view of the Shenandoah Valley looking towards Browntown. And in this opening, we found masses of a beautiful white spurge in bloom.

Near the High Point of Dickey Ridge, Looking Northwest

Near the High Point of Dickey Ridge, Looking West

From the high point, it was mostly downhill all the way back to the Visitor's Center where we were parked. The downhills always bother my knees more than the uphills. Once back at the car we had only done about 6 and a half miles, not a very long day. Ann wanted to do something but wasn't sure what. As we were leaving the Park, Ann asked, "Hey, do you want to go to Jeff and Kelly's?" Given that it was only 2:30, why not? Fifteen minutes later, we were at the winery where we got a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc to enjoy outside. Kelly joined us when she could and we caught up for a couple of hours before we headed back to Winchester.

Tasting the New 2015 Sauvignon Blanc

The Vineyard and the Ridgeline Where We Hiked

Beautiful Afternoon to Sit Outside

Kelly Brought us Some Chocolates

Gorgeous Delphinium at the Winery

Meeting Levi

Sunday, we drove out to Tom and Ann's in Capon Bridge, WV, ostensibly to have a leisurely afternoon lunch with them, but the ulterior motive was certainly to meet their new dog, Levi, who was most certainly the star of the show, despite all of Tom's many culinary efforts. So, meet Levi....

Levi

Lev's a big boy and very eager to please, no doubt because he came from a local shelter after a couple failed placements. His sweet disposition doesn't change the fact that he's 85 pounds of happy wagging tail. That thing's a weapon! I found out quickly when I took him for a walk that he has a rock fetish: excavating and carrying rocks seems to be his thing!

Cheese and Salame, Two of the Basic Food Groups

We arrived to this wonderful spread of cheese and salame: Gorgonzola Dolce, Stilton, Fiscalini Cheddar and Asiago Stravecchio (extra vecchio/older than 18 months) for cheeses, and a chorizo picante and rosette de Lyon for sausages. The rosette de Lyon in particular was outstanding. We do a lot with Fiscalini cheeses at the restaurant and I just love the products from this farm in Modesto, CA.

Tom, Doing his Thing

After warming up with some cheese, sausage, and wine (an Alto Adige Gewürztraminer, a Sierra Foothills Sauvignon Blanc that I brought, a Napa Zinfandel, a Sierra Foothills Cab, and a Columbia Valley Syrah), Tom got on to lunch proper: ham, potato gratin, and carrots. All quite wonderful, but just couldn't compete with Levi! ;)

Ham with a Pineapple-Jalapeño Sauce

Gratin of Potatoes with Stilton

Carrots and Dill

Honeymoon: Patricia Green Cellars and Ayres Vineyard

Wednesday May 1, Ribbon Ridge AVA OR

Wednesday marked our second of three days tasting in the Willamette Valley and we did something very unusual for us: we arranged for a local driver and a tour of the valley. This is unusual because I really dislike canned tours for the same reason I hate tasting at a lot of wineries: the tour guide is working by rote just like the pourer bot is reciting a canned script. Nauseating.

We found Jack Cranley, self-employed owner of Backroads Wine Tours, on the Internet and after reading through his reviews, I sent him an exploratory email, in part to judge his responsiveness and in part to judge our level of compatibility. Very shortly I had a response from him. Not only a response, but one that made it clear that he not only read and understood my email, but one that indicated that he was a kindred spirit in seeking out small producers of extraordinarily high quality makers of Burgundian-influenced Pinot Noir. I went with my gut and my gut said Jack was the right guy. Boy was I ever right!

Patricia Green Cellars

Jack picked us up at the B&B around 10:30 and off we went in his minivan with the dual automatic sliding doors, definitely a pimped out soccer-mobile ;). I had no idea where we were headed and wanted to be surprised so Jack only told us about the next winery as we were on route to it. Of all the wineries in the Willamette Valley, the one that I most wanted to visit was Patricia Green Cellars. Imagine my surprise as we pulled up to a stop sign just having passed hundreds of glorious California Poppies on the side of the road and Jack announced that we would be stopping first at Patty Green!

It turns out that Jack decided to show us around the Ribbon Ridge AVA, the smallest of the Willamette sub-appellations and many would argue, the best. As we turned off North Valley Road (right next to Beaux Frères), I loved the fact that there isn't any sign out front of Patricia Green Cellars indicating it's a winery (keeps the tourists away) and that there is no multimillion-dollar tasting room. What it says to me is that they are all about the wine as am I.

As we exited the minivan, we met the four-footed greeting committee, Chompers, a Corgi cross Border Collie who barked and barked, the whole while his tail wagging in big circles, a real tough guy. An unnamed black lab mix woofed somewhat half-heartedly from up near the house, but clearly wasn't interested in people. Inside the spartan and utilitarian winery building, Chompers would clearly prove that he and winemaker Jim Anderson are best buddies.

Patty was just rolling out as we arrived and so we were left in the ultra-capable hands of her friend,  business partner, and winemaker Jim Anderson. By Jim's own word, he mostly deals with the wines and Patty mostly deals with the vines.

High Tech Décor!

We tasted on a makeshift table standing on the concrete slab floor in the utilitarian winery in front of a ratty burner atop a propane tank to provide a bit of warmth: it hit 34 degrees overnight where we were and there were a lot of people seriously worried about frost. I could see where several people had hastily mowed in an attempt to let the cold air slide off the hillsides and I heard tell of one winery owner who brought in a helicopter that morning to mix up the air, much to the delight of his neighbors.

We started with Sauvignon Blanc 2011, the first and only SB that we would taste in Oregon and it was credible with enough acid to make it pleasing. Of course, the acidity should be good in the very cool 2011 vintage. Then it was on to the current 2011 Pinots: Estate Old Vine, Bonshaw, Anklebreaker Block, Balcombe, Balcombe Block 1B, Durant, Marine Sedimentary, and Volcanic. This was really a fantastic tasting that helped me come to grips with two of the predominant soil types in the valley: marine sedimentary (Ribbon Ridge) and volcanic (Dundee Hills).

You Are Jealous of This Line-Up. You Are!

After this, we tasted two library wines, 2002 Quail Hill and 2001 Four Winds, delicious wines that are all the better for having a decade of bottle age. We had a case of the Quail Hill shipped home: it was that delicious!

And finally just before we left to move on, Jim asked rather enthusiastically, "Do you want to taste some muscat?" How could we say no? And so we finished with barrel sample of a dry Muscat Ottonel 2012 that will make a fun patio wine for sure.

Ayres Vineyard



Ann Did

From Patricia Green Cellars on the west side of the AVA, our next stop was up on top of Ribbon Ridge on the south end of the AVA at Ayres Vineyard. Their tag line "We grow it. We make it. We live it. We love it." was almost palpable as soon as we were greeted with a warm smile by Brad McLeroy, winemaker extraordinaire who cut his teeth at Domaine Drouhin Oregon in the nearby Dundee Hills.

Brad is enthusiastically proud of his wines and loves where he lives and grows wine. And he should be. He lives in one of the world's great wine appellations and he makes some of the best wines in that appellation.

We started our tasting at a nice bar off to the left side of the underground winery, with barrels stacked around us. This so reminds me of utilitarian tasting tables crammed into corners of wineries in France and Germany. The gigabuck tasting room is an American thing and nothing says "this is about the wine" to me more than absence of a tasting room.


Brad McLeroy

Too Cute!

We started with the 2011 Pinot Blanc which is utterly delicious and high acid, 2011 being the coolest vintage on record in Oregon. When we started talking about how good the wine was, Brad started talking about how well the Pinot Blanc aged and then suddenly raced off to the back and emerged bearing a bottle of 2005 Pinot Blanc. Tasting that wine was a serious OMG moment for me. I asked Brad if he would sell me a case of the wine, but when he checked, he has but four remaining bottles. He did however give us the open bottle, which we lovingly sipped at happy hour later that afternoon out on our balcony. This wine, of all the wines we tasted in the Pinot Noir capital of the US, a white wine, would prove to be the best wine of our trip.


Best Wine of our Trip

We went on to taste four bottlings of Pinot Noir, all estate fruit, and about the third bottle, a house and terroir style emerged: funky nose and a blueberry core wrapped in baking spices. These wines were unlike wines we had elsewhere and while each wine was distinct from the others, the family resemblance was there; this was certainly the best expression of unique terroir and house style that we tasted. These wines would prove to be my favorite group of the trip and Ribbon Ridge has now clearly supplanted Yamhill-Carlton as my favorite of the Willamette sub-appellations.

After tasting the bottled wines, Brad eagerly clambered up on the barrel stacks to steal us some 2012 barrel samples. Already it is evident that this is going to be a fantastic vintage.


Lavender Trailing Down 7 Feet from Above!

As much as we would have liked to have stayed and enjoyed the scenery at Ayres, Jack reminded us that it was getting long in our day (now after 1pm) and we still needed to grab some lunch, so we reluctantly shook hands with Brad and set off down Lewis Rogers Road and the very north end of Ribbon Ridge.