Wed, 4 July 2007

Today was hot. How hot? Damn hot.

I think it reached 36 degrees.

I woke up in the morning after a horrible sleep. Not sure if the AC was working in my room, but it was so hot in there that I couldn’t sleep. I walked down to the store for some breakfast and proceeded to walk around the orchards that were near my motel. It was really hard not to walk over to a cherry tree and pick off a few of the deep purple fruit that was hanging all over the place. Cherries just came in season.

After a cut at the barber shop, a quick tour around the town and some lunch, I headed north toward Penticton. The goal of the day was to get to Kelowna. It wasn’t very far, so I decided to stop at a few wineries along the way.

The first one I visited was actually right in Osoyoos called Nk’Mp. Canada’s first aboriginal owned winery, this place was clustered with the Osoyoos Indian Band’s new golf course, Desert Interpretive Centre, and condominium complex. I’ve heard Chief Clarence Louis speak at several occasions about the success they’ve had down here, but you don’t really ‘get it’ until you see it.

The wine, however, was simply ok. Not fabulous. It’s a young winery though, and with time I’m sure they’ll hone the craft a bit more. I ended up getting a bottle of Pinot Noir, simply because it had a heavy oak to it. I’m not normally a huge fan of the Pinot (despite the heavy promotion in Sideways), but this one was a bit heavier, which I like with my reds.

I continued north and ended up in an area off the highway called the Black Sage Bench- a large mesa on the side of the hills. I visited three wineries there.

The first (and second of the day) was Burrowing Owl. Nice place. It was actually the last winery I visited last year before heading home, and was in a bit of a rush at that time. I took my time this year and sampled four wines. They were all impressive, but it was the Pinot Gris that really grabbed me. Light, fruity, pops full of flavour. I was never a fan of whites until I came to the Okanagan last year. Now I’m hooked. I took two bottles…one for this trip and another to take home.

The third winery of the day was Desert Hills, which was right down the road from Burrowing Owl. Very small winery, but family owned with a nice couple hosting the tasting room. They had some wines that impressed me more that Burrowing Owl. The small family owned places tend to do that: more focus on the craft than the marketing. The only problem is that they end up being very small and you can’t get their product in stores…which is why people like me visit them. It was very hard to decide which wine to purchase, but after I tried their Gewurztraminer there was no more debate. Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. I took two bottles here too.

I was feeling pretty good about my finds for the day so I decided to head back to the highway and get to Kelowna. On the way, however, I saw another winery and decided to stop.

And am I ever glad I did. I found my new favourite winery!

Silver Sage Winery is also very small because they use a unique process that does not use sulfites. What this means is that the winemaking process takes more time and fruit to produce the wines, but the flavours are much more intense. And ‘intense’ isn’t a strong enough adjective to use here. This place was amazing.

I ended up trying about 10 wines and was strongly considered buying wines by the case here and getting them shipped. They were that good. I calmed myself down and decided to take 2 bottles (cos that’s all I hard room for): a merlot and a blueberry dessert wine. When I get home I will be ordering their stuff online. They will ship to SK for free.

The rest of the day was very pleasant as I drove north. The temperature was crazy hot but the view was spectacular. See the pics. I got into Kelowna around suppertime and checked into the now famous La Mission Motor Inn. It got a creekside room this time so I can watch he freshwater salmon swim upstream. Pretty cool.

Went to bed early. I was damn tired after being in that heat.