Photo Courtesy of the Lompoc Record & Tenley Fohl Photography
One of the purposes of Wine Geographic is to expand the meaning of “wine country” beyond the widely recognized borders of places like Napa and Tuscany to include lesser known regions as well as the hottest wine spots in other cities closer to our readers’ homes. In the course of our mission, we’ve begun to see a new crop of wine festivals springing up around the country and they’re highlighting beautiful producers who might otherwise be relegated to the back burner – very unjustly so, by the way.
That brings us to the much-appreciated article we just spied in the Lompoc Record. They’re directing our collective focus to springtime wine events in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara and we can’t help but agree that these to-dos would make a fantastic excuse for a weekend escape to the west coast.
There are some unexpected benefits to attending the three events the Record mentions, too:
To make the coverage of wine events more valuable to our readers, I focus mainly on those that benefit great local charities and/or provide wine lovers with an educational experience they won’t forget. You’ll find that the events hosted by the wine associations (representing their wine regions or appellations as we wine geeks like to say) in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties always create long weekend events. It’s the best way to include all of their winery members, even those that don’t operate tasting rooms of their own. Plus, the vintners associations always make the prices affordable for everyone.
Basically, theses fests are run by people who have a true connection the wine, costs are reasonable, and at least one includes a fundraiser that uses proceeds to support immigrant farmworkers and their families.
The fests in question are the Santa Barbara Vintners Spring Weekend (April 20 to 23), Vintage Paso Zinfandel Weekend (now through March 19), and the Talley Vineyards Spring Fling (April 26).
For more information, head over to the Lompoc Record’s original piece. And hey, if you go, tag us in your pics! We’d love to see.
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