Yesterday at the Gilmour Car Museum, in addition to having a wonderful day (Thank you, Joan for suggesting), we discussed the possibility of sometime this summer or even this fall, doing a 'winery crawl' here in West Michigan. The west coast boasts wineries that rival anything in California, both in product and atmosphere, and could be an interesting, and very fun outing. Here is the link to the website for the West Michigan Wineries:
http://www.miwinetrail.com/ . There are 11 wineries on the trail, with some pretty well knowns such as St. Julian and Tabor Hill.
I would suggest that if we are going to do this, we would need to let them know ahead of time how many of us would be coming at one time. A couple of the wineries actually specify this, but knowing how winery tasting rooms work (we've been to some from Michigan to Croatia), I am sure they would all appreciate the heads up.
This website has included a link for dining along the trail (
http://www.miwinetrail.com/Dining.html). If we decide to do this, I could querie some of the wineries to see which one would be the best for us to choose....some thing not too expensive, large enough for a larger group, and close enough that if we wanted to stay on the tour after dining, we could easily manage it.
One other option that we have done before is for everyone to bring a picnic style lunch and find a nice scenic park to dine.
Most wineries are only open from 12 -5 for tasting, so we may also opt just to wait until we get to as many wineries as we can by 5 and dine after.
I am willing to make the connections but have some suggestions:
First, I think it would be very important for everyone to have a designated driver. Going from winery to winery, even to have the little 'taste' has the potential to put you in the 'impaired' range for driving. Because we want everyone to be safe, a DD would be highly suggested.
Also, you will want to make sure to leave some room in the back of your 'Smartie' for your purchases
Please take a look at the websites and let me know what you think. If there is enough interest, I will begin making calls.
Kathy;)
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