Believe it or not, there is another Lutheran Pastor who is as enthusiastic as I am about wine and faith. His name is Barry Rogge. When he retired from the church Barry looked around for a new challenge. He taught snow skiing for a while, and then discovered his new calling to pour wine at
Archery Summit Winery.
That's Barry in the photo above talking to Robin. He had some family visiting from the Seattle area, so we got the tour of the whole facility, and what a facility it is. It is the wine making facility you would make if money were no object. Everything is gravity fed, meaning they load the fruit outside from a higher platform. It goes down into the fermentation area, and then gently flows down into the caves to be aged in oak barrels. This gravity feed means a minimum of pumping the wine from place to place. And these are real caves.
That's the new winemaker, Chris Mazepink walking down one of the many wine cave corridors in the photo above. It was such a joy touring the facility with Barry, because he knows everybody. Chris and his crew have been working without much of a break since early September. They looked tired, and it makes me thankful for two things. First that I don't make wine for a living, and second that there are so many people who are willing to work so hard to make it available to us.
After tasting some of the wines Robin and I walked around the estate. Up above the winery building there are some funny vents that stick up in the middle of the vineyard. It occurred to me that those were the vents for the wine caves. These vines are growing right over the tops of those caves.
We tasted some wines and Barry and I compared our wine and theology presentations. We both agree that wine is used in the Bible as a metaphor for blessing. It was fun to be out in a vineyard one more time before the color is all gone and the rainy season settles in for good. There was even a brave rose still blooming and putting out new buds. What an amazing fall this has been.
