Tickets are now on sale at http://www.avwines.com
Not official list of winery’s yet, should be pretty much the same as last year. Ill update with that info once its posted. No increase to number of sold tickets again this year (its been capped for almost 10 years) to keep the event from over crowding. 650 tickets, 50-55 wineries depending on layout.
The technical session on Friday is great for ITB or AV PN super fans. Agenda to be announced as its firmed up.
Most winery’s will be debuting 2015 vintage with a couple like me with later release of the 2014.
The open houses on Sunday are free and fun. Every winery does something different and unique. Well be doing our normal Oysters (with our '16 SB available as futures) and hand carved leg of prosciutto, cheeses etc. in the cellar amung the barrels. With our new release 2014 PInot Noirs and likely a couple library wines.
Friday, May 19, 2017Technical Conference,
Casual BBQ, and
Winemaker Dinners
Saturday, May 20, 2017
Grand Tasting, and
Winemaker Dinners
Sunday, May 21, 2017
Winery Open Houses
Hope to see some Berserkers this year!
I read about this festival last year and have been chopping a the bit to go. I now have my air, hotel reservations, tickets to 2 dinners Friday and Saturday evening, tickets for the Grand Tasting, and finally the open house on Sunday. I am now trying to find out if Uber is available to to and from the sites from my hotel in Ukiah. Suggestions would be welcome.
There is not really any Uber presence here, sorry about that. Not sure how they could work with most areas not having cell reception let alone 4G or anything high speed. There are a couple of taxi and driving servisce companies that work with the winegrowers association to provide some transpiration servisces. I wold reach out to them for those contacts, info at avwines dot com. There is a taxi servisce in Ukiah as well that will come into the valley some use this from time to time. Its not cheap but is at least one option. Boonville is about 30 minutes away from Ukiah and to get thru the rest of the 15 miles of the valley is about another 15-20 minutes. Scheduling rides in advance is the best recommendation as again cell servisce is spotty at best, provider dependent sort of, once you leave Boonville.
That may not be the exact answers you want to hear but trust me getting here is the reward. We are still dominated by husband and wife or husband and wife and one employee properties making great Pinot Noirs and some random whites. The larger wineries are still not that big and make wines from all over the county. The grand tasting has not increased ticket sales for nearly 10 years though doubled the number of wineries.
Things are still very quaint and bucolic here even on our biggest wine weekend of the year. See you then Michael!