Of all the places that I visited on my recent tour of the Northwest, the Yakima Valley reminded me most of my home here in West Texas. While we were touring the area the temperatures topped out somewhere in the mid 90s. The good news is, that with an average rainfall in the Yakima Valley of less than 9 inches, it was a dry heat (of course, so is a blowtorch). On the bus that took us from the Tri-Cities (Kennewick, Richland, and Pasco) to Yakima, we were treated to some really interesting facts about the Yakima Valley, compliments of...
The Good Every once in a great while a post so epic, so innovative, so damn funny that it just can't be ignored comes along. Earlier this week, such an event took place. I have long been lamenting the lack of truly quality satire in wine blogging. I mean, sure there are those who take a stab at it, but most of the attempts are incredibly ham-handed and obvious, which makes the more imaginative posts that much more enjoyable. Josh Wade from Drink Nectar posted a really great introduction to the new sport of "Speed Wine Blogging". Trust me folks,...
Last week was the first time that I had ever set foot in the state of Oregon. I have spent a good deal of time in Washington, mostly the Seattle area, but I've never managed to make it to visit Washington's neighbor to the South. When the opportunity to leave a couple of days early for the Wine Bloggers' Conference and hit up the Willamette Valley presented itself, I eagerly altered my travel plans. I flew into Portland, where I met up with Tamera Belgard of Sip With Me fame, followed by Joe Herrig from Suburban Wino, and then we...
I had been wanting to catch up with Joe Roberts all weekend at the Wine Bloggers Conference, and it just never really happened. We were all so busy, and on top of all the mayhem, Joe was busy dealing with some sadness on the homefront, as his dog passed away while he was out of town. As a dog owner, I can understand how difficult a time he was having diving into the full experience of the conference. Given all of this, I was excited to hear that Joe was going to be riding in the car with me and...
I've never been one to resist peer pressure. I say when the times get tough, do what everyone else is doing. So, in that spirit, here is my "what I learned" post from #wbc10. Please forgive me if I talk a lot about bloggers in this post, but improving my craft as a blogger was really the purpose of the conference, and I promise I will get the blog stuff out of my system and not write about it again for a while. The wine blogging community seems to be doing pretty well in the authenticity category – One of...
One week ago tomorrow, I started a week long stewing of my liver in wine that took me from Portland and the Willamette Valley, to Yakima and on to Walla Walla. Since all of that drinking tasting just wasn't enough, I decided to hang out with Josh Wade in Spokane. The Spokane Convention and Visitor Bureau sponsored a couple of us bloggers to stay a night in a beautiful hotel, and escorted us around the city to learn about what is going on in the Spokane wine world. I will be doing a full write up on my trip and...
Fresh on the heels of the 2010 Wine Bloggers' Conference, I jumped in a car with Josh Wade (Drink Nectar) and Joe Roberts (1WineDude), and headed out to Josh's stomping grounds of Spokane. I really hadn't gotten much of an opportunity to talk with Joe while we were in Walla Walla, so I enjoyed getting to spend some time chatting with him. After all, it's not everyday that you get the opportunity to ride in a car with the Wine Blog Award winner for best overall wine blog. Upon arriving in Spokane, we met up with Pam Scott with the...
Yesterday was a packed day, filled with a ton of activity, lots of wine tasting (possibly too much), and an incredible amount of bonding with great new friends from around the country. Pretty early on in the day, I realized that I was going to be too busy having fun to spend much time blogging. Today I'm busy too, but I wanted to get out some updates for you guys, who are probably waiting on the edge of your seat to know what I'm doing with every waking moment of my day . 9:15 am - Today I'm starting off...
Finally, the day has arrived. The morning started off with a search for breakfast, a quest that lead the group that I was with to a restaurant whose slowness of service nearly caused me to pass away from hunger. Josh Wade, Steve Paulo, and I met up with David Honig, Rick Bakas, Jeff Lefevre, and Sasha Kadey on the way over and had some great conversation. After the breakfast, we got registered for the conference, and spent some time tasting some wines from around the state of Washington. One of my top priorities was to pick up the pieces of...
When I was making my plans for the 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference in Walla Walla, it took the Wine Brat all of one tweet on Twitter to convince me that I should just extend my stay and go with the group that was going to be going on a tour of the Willamette Valley before the conference. Today's pre-pre-conference trip was all about learning more about the world of Oregon wine, and especially about some wonderful Pinot Noir. After a leisurely morning, mostly spent piddling around on Twitter and watching the USA's dramatic World Cup victory, Joe Herrig of Suburban...
After months of counting down the days, I finally landed in Portland yesterday. I've been anxiously waiting to experience some great Oregon and Washington wine, but more importantly, I've been looking forward to meeting a lot of the friends that I've made online. Yesterday I arrived at the Portland Airport and Tamara Belgard (Sip With Me) was waiting to pick me up so that we could meet up with some other winos who were already starting the tour of the local tasting rooms. We met up with a group spearheaded by locals Lynnette Shaw and Ryan Reichert, just as they...
As I have seen my trip out to the Pacific Northwest next week rapidly approaching, I have started to become somewhat overwhelmed with the preparation still underway, much like my friend Joe describes in his most recent Suburban Wino blog post. Granted, my anxiety is mostly due to the ridiculous procrastination regimen that I have put myself on in the past few weeks. I have done some high level consideration of the content of my panel talk, even jotting down some notes, but I am a damn sight short of "ready". Further adding to the stress, I have a touch...
So, this may come as a huge surprise to all of you, but I sometimes have a tendency to run a little behind schedule. I have a stack of post ideas and video footage that I have been needing to work my way through, and I finally got around to one that I was really excited about. Unfortunately, this footage goes all the way back to May 1st, which was National Homebrew Day. I met up with Lubbock's local homebrew club, and talked with Cary Franklin from Sograte BBQ and Brew about what the club is doing, and what they...
The Good There was a great post on Good Grape this week about a topic that is near and dear to my heart, localism. I have always been a huge proponent of anything local. I always prefer to spend my hard earned money at a locally owned business, and on locally produced products, instead of a mega-chain whenever possible. As a wine lover in West Texas, I often find myself in a little bit of a quandary. Although there are many Texas wines that I really enjoy, you still find that the best wines in the world are produced in...
SUBMIT BLOG
HOW IT WORKS
Scan your favorite wine blogs every day.
Search over 150 wine blogs
Click to visit the blog or browse all of the bloggers intros.
Wine bloggers reach new audiences and readers find new
wine blogs and keep up with their favorites.
Register
Link to WineWonks