California Grapescapes

I well remember the first time I drove through Napa Valley, back in 1968. I picked up my allotment of Beaulieu Vineyards Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon at $6 a bottle. Stocked up on Martini Special Selections. And looked out over a seemingly endless carpet of winegrapes. Stopping by Trefethen, I stopped to get out and take a close look at real Cabernet Sauvignon fruit - even pick one berry. This was the real stuff. It was romantic. And rare. Nowhere else in the world, outside of France (I thought) could one experience such a thing.

In those days I didn't know of the vast vineyard plantings that once carpeted Cucamonga in Los Angeles County. Nor of ancient vineyards planted in the California Gold Rush country. New York State wine was, at that time, a completely different - and lesser - animal. Well-versed wine aficionados knew that there was some kind of red table wine produced in Italy and maybe in Spain, but few had experienced it. None of us imagined South African wine, or even Australian. The action was in France and, now, California. And it was 1968.

Vineyards, to wine lovers, are like gardens. We study different trellising methods just for the fun of knowing about them; and revel in the mystique of "dry farming." If the Geneva Double Curtain Trellis pertained to table grapes, who would care? And who would give two cents to learn about dry farmed avocados? Vineyards, to wine lovers, are not fields in which fruit is grown to produce wine; they are sacred places worthy of pilgrimage! The holy aura still still be felt in such places as Martha's Vineyard, Volcanic Hill or Bien Nacido - sites which traditionally provide extraordinary terroir for the most distinguished bottlings.

But new life is coming to California hillsides and valleys. The drive north from Paso Robles to Salinas, once dulled by sagebrush and oil wells, now hosts the largest single vineyard in the world! And the sleepy little old Western town of Los Alamos in Santa Barbara County now sports an agglomeration of Chardonnay vineyards, planted by Meridian and Kendall-Jackson.

Prior to the last year or two, almost all Californians celebrated their vineyard acreage and were delighted to see their dry, chapparal covered hills and sage covered valleys metamorphose into a sparkling vineyard paradise. But big business has hit the California wine industry. Over the course of the past decade, we've added more than 100,000 acres of new vineyard, according to Allied Grape Growers - an increase of 30%. Napa Valley is now totally under vine. Grapes and wine are now the #1 industry in seven counties! And not everybody is applauding the loss of natural environments to any kind of agriculture. Oak trees are being uprooted and habitats eliminated. Landscapes are rapidly evolving into grapescapes.

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