So where's the Two Barns from? It's not one I've had or read about.
Here's my old post on Del Rio:
Topic: TN: Why Del Rio Vineyards is my new favorite Oregon winery
Author: Jenise
Date: 20031201171632
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On Tuesday night, November 18th, I locked the back door of my Huntington Beach, California, home for the last time and climbed into the GMC truck I rented from U-Haul to drive my personal wine collection 1500 miles north to our new home in Washington state. Bob was already in residence there with five of our seven cats, and I'd driven our three cars up. This was the final go.
I'd looked at other means of shipping the wine, but finally decided that the only way I could be sure it was handled right was to drive it myself. So in the back of the truck were about 100 cases of wine packed and shimmed in a single layer so that none could move, four bar stools that were delivered after the moving van had left, a small suitcase and a pillow to make motel beds tolerable. In the cab with me were Armistead Maupin's latest book, a bag of bottled water and road food, the two girl cats I'd kept down south with me for company, Bob Junior and Jailbait, and a litter box.
I actually wasn't scheduled to leave until Wednesday and I'd planned to practice driving the truck some before taking off (I'd not driven it but to back it in or out of the driveway), but I suddenly realized that if I left in the dark, I couldn't look back and I didn't want to look back. I mean every possible interpretation of that sentence, so off we went my girls and I; they cried, I didn't. We travelled about two hours and spent the night with friends in Ventura County.
The second night was spent somewhere north of Sacramento, poised to take Mount Shasta in daylight and get well into Oregon by the end of the next day. But the further north I drove, the more ominous the weather got. Snow slowed us to a crawl over the 8,000 ft Siskiyou pass, and on the radio I heard that a foot of snow had immobilized both Seattle and Portland, the earliest on record or close to it. Worse, temps were falling into the low 20's and there was more bad weather everywhere within driving range of my present location. I could neither outrun nor hide my precious cargo from the severe, unseasonable cold.
So I started thinking of protective places to park my wine overnight that would afford the 9 foot clearance needed for my truck--a warehouse, a gas station maybe, a firehouse, a Jiffy Lube. With darkness coming soon I would not have time to drive to Eugene and then look, I was going to have to start looking here where I was. And where was I? Medford. About the very instant I reached that conclusion, I passed a billboard for Del Rio Vineyards. It was a light bulb moment: who would better understand my predicament better than fellow wine lovers?
I picked up my cell phone. "Hello, my name is Jenise Stone," began that call, "and you don't know me, and this is going to sound VERY strange, but I'm driving my personal wine collection to a new home in northern Washington...." Fifteen minutes later my truck was safely parked in the cold storage barn at Del Rio Vineyards. Owner and new friend Jolee Wallace, who took my call, seemed taken with the whole prospect. Such, in fact, is the goodness of these fine people, that rather than admit to any inconvenience they seemed incredibly pleased that a wine lover in distress would think to ask this favor of them. And so it was, too, that when I stepped into the tasting room which was just about to close, everyone there (the Wallaces, some locals, and a wandering poet) knew of my predicament and bent over backwards to make me feel welcome. So much so that the wine poured freely until several hours past closing time, and they opened many an expensive bottle to show me what Del Rio's doing.
To be dead honest, if the wines had been dreck I'd have bought a few cases out of gratitude, and I have to admit to not being familiar with Del Rio before my phone call. But lucky me, I picked a terrific winery to beg help from and my cellar is all the better for it.
These were my favorites:
2001 Del Rio Claret Made by one of Oregon's best known winemakers, Ken Wright, this claret is made from equal parts Cab Sauv, Merlot, Malbec and Cab Franc. A big, dark, well-balanced, complex wine, and rather a revelation to those of us who most associate Oregon wine with it's floral pinot noirs. It's so good I haven't been able to stay out of it, and we've already drunk three of the six bottles I purchased. I'll hold the rest. $35.
2001 Del Rio Cabernet Franc Also made by Ken Wright, this delicious Cab Franc is more European in style than most American Cab Francs I've had. With flavors of blackberry, licorice and celery root in a medium-to-full bodied wine, this wine skips the tendency to let oak smooth over cab franc's brambly nature. Out of an admittedly sparse pool of five or six Oregon cab francs I've had, this is easily the best. They told me that Ken estimates this to be a ten-to-fifteen year wine. $35.
2002 Del Rio Pinot Gris Pale with that slightly smokey hint behind the pears, this concentrated but clean-crisp wine is the style I like best and a good example of why I prefer pinot gris to all other whites but Sauvignon Blanc. Just terrific, and I have no idea what I paid for it.
In addition to their own wines, Del Rio's tasting room pours wines from other wineries, Ken Wright's own labels among them. I bought some of Ken's hard-to-find syrah, the one he named for his two children--Tyrus Evans, I think it is, though I don't have a bottle in front of me to be certain. They also sell Domaine Serene pinot noirs, and it so happens that the Evanstadt Reserve is one of my three favorite Oregon pinots. When I mentioned that I owned the 98 and a few prior vintages, the cork flew off a bottle of the 99 without hesitation in spite of the fact that the hour was late and this is a $50 wine. The 99 is even better than the 98 it turns out, and I added 8 bottles of it to my purchase.
I hope I don't sound like I'm shilling, cause I'm not. That I will never be able to forget the kindness and hospitality shown me here is not the reason I recommend their wines, but it is certainly the reason I'm so pleased to have such good things to say about both their wines and their tasting room, which is what most wine lovers wish for but don't often find: an inviting room where a good variety of top notch, well-made wines are poured with a friendly, down-to-earth attitude. It's located just north of Medford in the town of Gold Hill (exit 43), less than a mile from I-5. You can read more about them at their website
http://www.delriovineyards.com.
If you're in the area, do visit.
