Wednesday

Well it finally warmed up to about the high 50's today here on top of the mountain but where we headed it reached 72, yikes was it ever nice and there was lots of sunshine and blue skies. After a 7:30 wake up we had our cups of hot coffee and teas then we did our quiet times before a great breakfast of  buckwheat cakes and eggs. We got ready then headed down off the mountain.

We made a wrong turn on our way towards Winston-Salem and its lucky we did because we found a winery by the name of Windsor Run which was on the way towards Wilkesboro. The gal who ran the tasting room was just full of knowledge and very social and we had a grand time tasting some very good French type wine from grapes grown on their estate. We never had one bad tasting vino. We even purchased some great Ashe County cheese for later consumption before our supper. We then headed towards the big city which by now was nearly 1 PM. We stopped in Mocksville and had a Subway sandwich before heading on towards the West End Winery. Wow was the grounds ever beautiful but the gals did the tasting as Dan and I tried tasting some micro brewed beer. We were not impressed with but with one of the brews and the gals had nothing good to say about the sweet wines. We did manage to collect a couple glasses to add to our collection. We next headed to downtown Winston.

We found Sam's Club by a stroke of luck as we missed the main mall road. We stocked up on some great sirloin steaks, salmon and a few other goodies before heading out toward the mountains.We decided to check out Old Salem and the Winkler Bakery where we purchased our mountain mom a sugar cake and some sugar cookies for ourselves. We strolled around the campus and took several pictures of this old city that is still being operated much like it was back in the 17 and 1800's.

 On the way towards I-77 we saw the notice that Ragapple Lassie Winery was on the way so we made a detour and visited it. We tasted a couple wines which were awesome but their bottles are really unique in shape and the labels are very neat as well. Nancy bought an apron which she wanted but we passed on any wine purchases as we spent our limit at the first winery. Our friends purchased some to share with their Florida family. We got back to the cabin after 7 PM after dropping off the sugar cake at Helen's. We had fresh carrots, salad and leftover spinach casserole along with grilled medium rare sirloin steaks, yikes was that ever good.

Well we are deciding what to watch or games to play but we want to watch Duck Dynasty as everyone has indicated its a must watch show, LATER Enclosed are few pics from the first winery, Old Salem and supper.