Visiting RdV Vineyards - Bordeaux Wines from the Hill Country of Virginia

I visited RdV Vineyards in Delaplane, Virginia this weekend and was very pleasantly surprised. It checked all of my boxes for a successful winery visit. Great winery architecture, an interesting tour and guide, and quality wines. I went in skeptical, as I generally have not had good experience with red wine coming out of east coast wineries, but RdV’s two red Bordeaux blends hold up really well against wines of this type from any region of the world.

Let’s start with the architecture and the tour.

In the center of the winery was a grain silo centered right over the stairs that led down to the wine caves. Looking up as I walked down the stairs provided this shot. I think I was lucky it was so foggy out, so the sun didn’t wash out the details of the structure of the silo with its crisscrossing support rods.

At the bottom of the stairs, one direction leads into the tank room where the grapes are fermented into wine and another direction leads to the wine caves where the barrels of wine are stored until they are ready for bottling.

The caves go deep under the hill behind the winery until ending at a wall of granite that is actually under some of the grape vines.

The owner of the winery selected this piece of land specifically because of the granite so that water drains away from the vines quickly. Thirsty vines make for better wines.

After the tour, we had a tasting of several different years of their two blends and a nice selection of charcuterie and cheese. I loved the table made from a slab of a tree left with its natural form.

It’s too bad I can’t do the wines justice in a description, but suffice to say I liked them well enough to end up with a wooden box full of bottles in my car as I drove away. If you live in the northern Virginia area, it’s worth a drive out Route 66 to Delaplane to try it for yourself.