By Barbara Platts, Aspen Times, June 12, 2015
…The group I brought was eager, but most, including myself, were relatively inexperienced with wines grown in Colorado. Excited to learn, we started at Azura Cellars, a beautiful winery and gallery overlooking Mount Lamborn and the quaint town of Paonia. This place actually grows its grapes in Palisade and packages in Paonia. On their grounds, they have a nice pond and a gallery with reasonably priced art and jewelry. If we hadn’t had a full schedule, we probably could’ve sat out there all day soaking in the sun and sipping on the Merlot and Riesling. That’s probably true about every place we went actually. But I had made an itinerary, and we were going to try out damndest to stick to it!
Next up was Delicious Orchards, which sells Big B’s Organic Juices and Hard Ciders. This is a far cry from a winery, but we thought it best to mix things up a bit. Plus, it was so impressive to see a company start, literally, at grassroots and gain popularity all over the state…
After we ate (and kept on drinking, of course) we were off to more wineries. First stop after lunch was Stone Cottage Cellars, then its neighbor Terror Creek Winery. Lastly, we went to Black Bridge Winery. We were all very impressed with each stop. Some of my personal favorites were the Syrah at Stone Cottage, the oak-free Chardonnay by Terror Creek and the Gewürztraminer and Merlot at Black Bridge…
