Boyne Valley Vineyards
Date Visited: November 8, 2019
Stop: #67
Kathy, Randy, Christie, and I continued our quest through the Petoskey wine region, leaving the Resort Pike Cidery and Winery and heading to our final destination of the day, Boyne Valley Vineyards. It was 4:45 pm when we pulled out of the Resort Pike driveway, and according to our GPS, we were 4.8 miles away from Boyne Valley Vineyards. We made a left hand turn out of Resort Pike and headed back to US-131 via Williams Road. Once there, we made a right and drove about 3.4 miles to the entrance to the vineyard, which was located on the west side of US-131. The driveway to the tasting room was a winding, uphill drive totaling 1,100 feet. From the outside, it was easy to see that the building was very new. Just how new, we would soon find out.
This was absolutely a beautiful place. Sitting on top of a hill, the tasting room was
long and tall – at least two stories high – and is a “monitor barn”-style
architecture. It had a couple of clear
garage doors that could be opened up during nice weather to allow customers to
move easily between the indoors and the outdoor seating areas. There was also a smaller, window-sized garage
door that was above a counter top that, when opened, could allow a party of
eight to sit with four people inside and four people outdoors across the
counter top from one another. Very cool. The outside area also included a large lawn
area surrounded by flower gardens, and their property borders a 113-acre nature
preserve.
The inside was very big – 1,500 square feet in all. The building is comprised of two halves. The front half extended the full two stories
to a peaked ceiling, all made of wood with lots of wood beams providing
support, and serves as the tasting room.
The sides of the room were all wood from the base of the windows up, and
corrugated metal from the base of the windows down to the concrete floor. The back wall of the room was comprised of
stone from the floor to the halfway point up the wall, and then wood from that
point to the ceiling. There was a metal
staircase at the back wall that led to a second floor supported with very large
wood beams. This was the back half of
the building and this is where things are going to get even cooler. Customers can walk upstairs to a balcony
where there’s a door that currently leads to nowhere — for now. The plan, which
is already in motion, is that the door will lead to an outdoor tree house
tasting room, 600 square feet in size, nestled amongst three maple trees behind
the building, and scheduled to open in August, 2021. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? How awesome will that be?
Continuing with the tour of the main tasting room, there
were cushioned chairs and coffee tables in the front and right side of the
room, and tall tables and stools on the left side of the room. The bar was three-sided, wood on the bottom,
and a black (possibly marble) countertop.
I kept imagining how fun this place must be in the summer time when all
the garage doors and windows are open, with people moving between the outdoors
and the indoors.
There were only a couple other people in the tasting room
at the time, so we were able to get seats at the bar. We were greeted by Christi, who just happened
to be one of the four owners of the vineyard.
She and her husband, Tom (Mahaney), and Tom’s twin sister Mary Anne and
her husband Marc (Lippe) are the owners.
They bought the vineyard property in 2015, planted grapevines in 2016,
and produced over 1000 gallons of wine in their first year. Currently, they have nearly 6,000 vines
planted on two of the Boyne Valley Vineyard properties - a 14-acre parcel in
Boyne City with 6 acres of Marquette and Petit Pearl vines, and four acres
planted on the property adjacent to the tasting room, where Marquette, La
Crescent, Itasca, and Frontenac Gris are grown.
Boyne Valley Vineyards does not currently make their wine onsite. The actual production of their wines takes
place in Boyne City. The Mahaneys and the Lippes plan to move wine
production operations to the tasting room property in 2022, at which time
public tours will be offered.
Christi told us that the tasting room had only been open
for 4 weeks (opening in October, 2019).
Christi told us that, like so many winery owners we have met, she, her
husband, and the Lippes turned their passion for wine into a business after
holding careers in totally unrelated fields.
Christi told us that she was an environmental engineer for 20-plus years. Mary Anne managed a restaurant, golf course,
and banquet center for more than 25 years.
Now, the two of them manage the day-to-day operations of the vineyard,
winery, and tasting room. Their husbands
are still working at their careers in medical sales, but they handle all the construction
projects on the property.
Christi handed us their wine menu and explained that a
tasting included our choice of 4 wines, and at the time of our visit,
they had seven wines on their menu. So,
to make the wine selection easy, Kathy and I decided that I would order the
white wines (of which there were 3) and she would order the red wines (also, 3
different kinds) and we both would order the Rosé. With that major decision out of the way, here
was our selections:
Kathy’s selections:
1. 2018 Short’s
Hill Red – This fruity dry red wine is a blend of
Frontenac and Chancellor grapes grown in northwest Michigan. The wine has aromas of red currant and fresh
strawberries and has a smooth finish with low tannins.
2. 2018
Marquette – This dry and medium-bodied red wine is the
first estate-grown vintage of Marquette grapes from our Aggie Vineyard in
northwest Michigan. This wine is lightly
oaked and has notes of cherries, black currants, and blackberries with a hint
of pepper.
3. 2018
Foxhole Red – This sweet red wine was made with Marquette
grapes grown in northwest Michigan.
Fresh raspberries and blueberries on the nose develop into a juicy and
sweet finish.
4.
Sunset Rosé – This pleasantly pink semi-sweet rosé
has notes of sweet maraschino cherry and finishes with a hint of sugar.
John’s selections:
1. Cayuga
White – This dry white wine has notes of lemon zest and green
melon with a pleasantly acidic finish.
2. 2018
Frontenac Gris – This seme-dry white wine, made from grapes
grown in northwest Michigan, tastes summery and fresh and has notes of
honeysuckle and fresh oranges.
3.
SnowCat White – This sweet white wine
was made from Vignoles grapes and has notes of honey and ripe tropical citrus.
4. Sunset
Rosé – This pleasantly pink semi-sweet rosé has notes of sweet
maraschino cherry and finishes with a hint of sugar.
Overall, Kathy and I enjoyed all of the wines offered at
Boyne Valley. We decided we needed to
take home at least one bottle from each type of wine. My favorites, of course, were the sweeter
wines. I think Kathy would have been
happy with any of them (seeing as she has a more mature wine palate than I do),
but she agreed to get the sweet wines.
So, we got a bottle of Foxhole Red, a bottle of SnowCat White, and a
bottle of Sunset Rosé. We took advantage
of the 10% discount per bottle being offered that day and cashed out 15 minutes
before closing time. I would definitely
rate this place one of the top wineries/tasting rooms we have ever visited. The atmosphere was out of this world, the
service was exceptional, and the wines were fantastic. It was hard to believe that they had only
been open for 4 weeks. But I could
imagine the incredible potential this place possesses, especially when the weather
is warmer and we could take advantage of the outdoor space. They currently have entertainment every
Saturday night, which just adds to the ambience of the place. Throw in the Treehouse tasting room and bar
coming later this year, and one would have to think, this will be one of the
most popular places in the northern reaches of Michigan. I truly cannot wait until we can come back
and visit.
But for now, we needed to concentrate on making our way
down to Traverse City. It was about 5:45
pm and we had an hour and 15-minute drive ahead of us. Besides needing to check into our hotel, we
also needed to grab some dinner.
The drive down was uneventful, which was good compared to
the last couple of years. We got
ourselves checked in at the hotel so now it was time to decide on dinner. We noticed a place not too far from where we
were staying, so that became our choice.
The restaurant was the Smoke & Porter Public House, which
specializes in wood fire cooked foods.
In fact, their website says they wanted the theme to be based on cooking
meat over a wood fire and the restaurant would smell like a late-night
campfire. Which, it did. They had repurposed an old fast-food
restaurant, so our challenge was to guess what fast food restaurant used to be
here. They had an atrium in the front,
which kind of narrowed our choices – Wendy’s, Taco Bell, Big Boy. My money was on Wendy’s but Randy nailed it –
the restaurant used to be an Arby’s – at least that is what our waitress told
us. In any event, they had a full bar
and carried several craft beers, one of which was called Pilsner Urquell, a
beer made in the Czech Republic just a few short miles from where our
daughter’s fiancée grew up. So, of
course, that was my beer of choice – probably the easiest choice I had to make
all weekend. Overall, this was an
excellent experience. The food was truly
fantastic (and smoky), and the service was awesome. And, of course, the beer was pretty darn
good, too. It’s always a bonus when you
stumble upon pleasant surprises, and that is how I would describe our visit to the
Smoke & Porter Public House.
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