vineyards | PHOTO ART BY SYLVIA VAN PEEBLES

This afternoon was so gorgeous I just couldn’t stay inside. I got in the car and started driving. Since I was already headed in the right direction for our wine country, I decided to go view some of the vineyards. There are over 36,000 acres of rolling hills and vineyards, and 35 member wineries. I love driving on Rancho California Rd. and looking at the rows and rows of grape vines.

Wine brings to light the hidden secrets of the soul, gives being to
our hopes, bids the coward flight, drives dull care away, and teaches
new means for the accomplishment of our wishes.
– Horace

It’s great having some of the best wine you can buy right in your own back yard. Because of our unusual micro climate (morning mist, warm midday sun, cooling ocean breezes and clear starry nights) and granite-based soil, the Temecula Valley has ideal conditions for growing grapes and creating award-winning premium wines. Our wines are recognized by wine connoisseurs internationally.

Port is not for the very young, the vain and the active. It is the comfort of
age and the companion of the scholar and the philosopher.
– Evelyn Waugh

The grape growing and wine making revival in the Temecula Valley began in the late 1960s. They started planting abundant acres of wine grapes in 1968. Callaway Winery was founded in 1974 giving birth to Temecula’s wine making.

When wines were good they pleased my sense, cheered my spirits,
improved my moral and intellectual powers, besides enabling me
to confer the same benefits on other people.
– George Saintsbury, 1910

Most of the wineries are small and family owned. If you visit, you are very likely to run into the owner, or winemaker, or other winery principals in the tasting rooms. You will find the wineries of Temecula to be friendly and personable.