Okanagan Sun-Mon

The second we heard BC was moving to Phase 3 (of COVID reopening, in case you are reading this in 2030) we jumped in the car and headed for wine country!! Or, possibly, we looked at travel options in BC and carefully selected a destination that seemed both safe in its protocols and vacation-y in its atmosphere.

Coronavacation 2020 started with a scenic, Coquihalla-avoiding drive where I read aloud the 500 Across clues from the Canada Day full-page G&M crossword puzzle while Jeff drove the Mini. We booked into our first 4 nights at the Summerland Resort and Spa (there will be no “spa-ing” during coronavacation … there are limits). Summerland is a cute little town – most of the towns in the Okanagan Valley are, except Kelowna which reminds me of Peterborough, Ontario, the city where I grew up.

The Resort is situated on the shore of Okanagan Lake, a 135 km lake that snakes through British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley. On the lake-shore, the resort has either preserved or created a small, self-contained marsh with a pond in which live turtles, beavers, and muskrats as well as several bird species including at least one Kingfisher, Red-winged Blackbirds (yay!), Swallows, Yellowthroats, Cedar Waxwings, and your basic Mallards. We have a room that faces the pond so I can spend hours looking at the birds through my binoculars. I’m hoping none of the other guests think I’m looking at them.

Speaking of other guests, the Resort has a pool and a hot tub both of which are in very high use. I find this surprising and a little alarming. I didn’t expect to find either open at all (I’m actually not entirely sure what Dr. Henry has to say on pools and hot tubs at the moment). Looking that the numbers of pool/hot tub users I am 100% not even entering the enclosed pool area.

We got settled, explored around a bit, and then had dinner next door to the Resort on the outdoor patio of the yacht club. This sounds more elegant than it actually was. It’s basically a roadhouse restaurant serving different kinds of burgers all covered with the same base of smokey barbecue sauce. I had the Hawaiian chicken burger with grilled pineapple and mango and smokey barbecue sauce. The food was surprisingly decent, and our server rushed our order over to the kitchen because we had about 10 minutes before they closed. But once we had our food, she generously said we could linger as long as we liked.

On Monday, we dedicated the entire day to winery tours and tastings. The wineries are only now just starting to open for both the season and the BC Phase 2-3 opening guidelines.

• Poplar Grove – We were lucky to arrive on Day 1 of their tasting bar opening, under new protocols that involved minimal guests inside, plexi shields between tasters and employees, and a contact tracing sign-up sheet if you visited the bathrooms. Once it was clear that we were going to be respectful of the rules, the staff were very friendly. Tastings have been changed to a choice of three 2-oz pours to limit interaction and provide the impression of value. We suggested that this was actually too much for a tasting, given that it amounts to a 6 oz glass of wine and most people would likely be going to several wineries in a day. I appreciate the challenges, however. They need to charge enough to make some profit with fewer people coming through, they need to use up the wines they’ve opened before they spoil, and they want people to get something of value for the tasting fee. It’s going to be a tough summer in the Okanagan, IMO. To help out, we purchased 6 bottles of wine. We are just that thoughtful.

• La Frenz – Their tasting process was an outdoor, table-seated affair. The winery was appropriately concerned about COVID but also easily confused by the change in what would have been their normal process. It took our server a few attempts to explain to us how to follow the very clearly marked directional arrows on the floor to the outdoor seating and the washrooms. The outdoor seating was a smart decision, and would have only been improved if our server had been wearing a mask. We ordered and paid for our take-home wine right at the table, and it was boxed and waiting for us on our way out.

• Joie – Joie (now known as JoieFarm) is well known for their Rose, which is not my favourite varietal despite its rapidly growing popularity. We didn’t do a formal tasting here because they were out of the wines we were interested in, but every time we asked about a specific wine, the proprietor brought us a taste anyway. Nothing special here, although we did buy a couple of bottles of red just to not be jerks.

• Red Rooster – The best thing about Red Rooster was the nest of baby starlings in one of the roof beams of the patio! The winery tasting was extremely well organized and COVID-respectful. We had a table outside and were given 4 choices of wine to taste that were once again 2 oz pours (!!). We started off confusing them by asking only for reds (the options were red/white regular or red/white reserve) but ultimately they did kindly make us a flight of reds. Good wines, not great, but again, we purchased a few bottles which waived the tasting fee.

• Maple Leaf Distillery – We stopped here on a whim to see if they made vodka (they didn’t). The owners are from Germany, and they make a few varieties of fruit-based grappa and liqueur, as well as a brandy that they put into barrels about 6 years ago. The grappa tasted like paint thinner to me, but Jeff bought a bottle. Mmmmmmm, can’t wait until we open that baby up. The owners also keep an assortment of pheasants in large bird cages and are working on breeding them as a hobby. Apparently the cages protect the pheasants from being eaten by predators, but do not prevent them from throwing themselves against the sides if a predator outside the cage terrifies them. Remind me not to do this then I retire and move to PEC.

For dinner, we went Zias Stonehouse Restaurant. Respectfully, we used some of their hand sanitizer when we arrived, only to discover that it smelled exactly like the Maple Leaf grappa. I immediately had to go to the bathroom and wash it off with soap. Zias just opened the day before, and was busy (bordering on too busy) but we did get a table that was tucked away in a corner which was good. I had an electric green margarita which tasted as bad as it looked, and a disappointing green salad, but the main course was quite good.