To the Red River Valley We Go: A Recent Texas Wine Trip

I tend to wax nostalgic around this time of year, not just because it is my birthday week, but also because we took our first big Texas wine trip to the Texas Hill Country for my fortieth birthday a few years ago. That trip laid the groundwork for subsequent trips to Texas wineries and also left a big impression on our family because it was the first non visit-family-type vacation we had ever taken. Since then we have taken a couple non visit-family-type trips that somehow always include a winery stop or two. One of these includes a brief but memorable stop at Brennan Vineyards back in May of 2016 (the write-up for this visit has been on the back-burner since but is coming soon!). However, this year we were unable to take a big road trip to celebrate my birthday, but we did take a quick trip to a couple wineries up in the Red River Valley a couple weeks ago. This trip included visits to Arché Winery and Blue Ostrich Winery and Vineyard near the hamlet of St. Jo, which lies a few miles south of the Red River. Though we were only there for a few hours, we had a great time and I will share some memories here.

Arché Winery
This visit to Arché has been a long time coming as I mentioned wanting to take a trip there on one of my first Texas wine blog posts, so my excitement bordered on ecstatic as we drove up the dirt road between rows of vines to their tasting room. We missed the opportunity to take a vineyard and winery tour by one week as harvest is slated to start a little early this year, so we "settled" on a fantastic wine tasting with winemaker Grayson Davies, son of Howard and Amy Davies, owners and operators of Arché. 

Rows of Arché Syrah.

I shared with Grayson that I had been wanting to visit Arché for a good while now and was excited to finally make the relatively short trip from Dallas. He noticed our matching "Texas Wine" tattoos, and told him that we got them from a fellow Texas wine aficionado a while back and thought it apropos to wear them for this trip.

Hurray for Texas rosé!

Our wine tasting stayed on the dry side of their 100% Texas wines and found them to be excellent with the Texas Rose (dry rosé of Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah) to be our consensus favorite. Other exceptional wines included the Roussanne and Ryan's Red (red blend of estate Cab and Syrah).  

Matchy, matchy for #TxWine.

While Grayson attended to other customers in the tasting room who arrived shortly after we did, his mother Amy came by and poured the next wine on our tasting. I forgot how the introductions came about, but she remembered that I had emailed her a few days prior to our visit, so we made our acquaintance, chatted about the vines, and talked 'shop' which included how they want to apply to have their vineyard recognized as their own American Viticultural Area. 

Veraison is well under way.

Amy shared with us some of their future plans that include to pull out and replant a portion of the vineyard near the winery to narrow the space between the rows which currently has a width of 12' (then narrow width to 8'), and then to expand their tasting room area by creating a patio for folks to enjoy both their wine and their scenery. This patio should be ready to go soon, perhaps as soon as this fall.

Future Arché patio, future wine fun!

On our next Red River Valley visit, we hope to take advantage of their vineyard and winery tour so we could not only broaden our Arché experience, because their strive for environment sustainability in their winemaking and viticulture intrigues me, but also to drink more of their amazing Texas wine. Priorities, right?



 
Thanks to Grayson and Amy Davies for an unforgettable first visit to Arché.
Let's just say that my wife and I cannot wait for our next visit!

Blue Ostrich Winery and Vineyard
A short and scenic route from Arché to Blue Ostrich Vineyards took us literally to the edge of Texas-- the Red River was essentially a stone's throw from the Farm to Market road we were on. Our plans at Blue Ostrich involved us arriving in time for a wine tasting and then take a tour of the vineyards and winery, but we instead got caught up in our great tastings and subsequent glass of wine so much so that we totally forgot about the tour. But who could blame us! The live music and gorgeous scenery kept us in the patio for the duration of our stay.

Truth is that there's great wine here!

As it was at Arché, our tastings stayed on the dry side of things though my wife did try a couple sweet whites which she did not find as appealing as she used to try during our early Texas wine travels. 

Each of our tastings were very nice, which I think had to do with how busy the tasting room as our visit also coincided with a live music event in the pavilion (perhaps also a wine club pick up event). Their estate viognier was our first wine to taste, which we enjoyed, but the highlights were a couple extra tastings, that included an inky dark petite sirah that the wife completely loved (huge surprise to me!), and the newly released Brüder, a reserve 2014 tempranillo made from grapes grown on the Blue Ostrich estate, which was released the day of our visit, and one that my wife also loved (another huge surprise!). I'm still awestruck that she loved that wine because she is not a big fan of tempranillos (my fave). I think the 'reserve' nature of the wine, having been aged a little longer in oak barrels, went a long way towards making this palatable for her.

Dig those 80s 'staches!

As wonderful as the wines were, we absolutely loved the view of the vineyard and beyond from our seats in the pavilion. I could not help but notice how much this view reminded me of the environs around Fredericksburg in the Texas Hill Country. Somewhere along the way during our visit there, I picked up a nice brochure that said that this area of Texas is the "north Texas Hill Country." I would have to agree as the views in and around both of these wineries did take my mind back to previous Texas Hill Country visits.

The last of the ostrich Mohicans at Blue Ostrich.

As is the case on our road trips, we do not know what we will see once we hit the road. Whether it was that surprisingly winding and scenic jaunt up FM 677 from St. Jo to Arché, then knowing how tantalizingly close our road was to the Red River on the way to Blue Ostrich, and finally knowing that these locales are so very close to the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, but yet felt so far away in our minds. The pull to make our pilgrimage to the Texas Hill Country and the wineries surrounding Fredericksburg is oh so very strong, but it is very comforting to know that we can hop in the car for an hour and half and experience something quite similar. We ventured up a familiar road but in a different direction, and it made all the difference in our world. It was certainly the wine road less traveled, but it will be one that will become quite familiar in due time.

Blue skies + vineyards = good times with Texas wine at Blue Ostrich!