Stomp them grapes

Lakeridge Winery has several events to bring customers in. Their two-for-one sale is one of our favorites, but this weekend they had another good one: the 24th annual Harvest Grape Stomp!  We headed out there with Gary and Erin. Lakeridge doesn't use the stomped grapes for their wine, of course; they don't even use their own grapes for the stomping. Instead they opened a few plastic clamshells of grapes, probably purchased at Public, and dumped the grapes into half-barrels with a few holes drilled into their bottom edge. Then their guests took off their shoes, climbed in, and stomped.

It was a contest, and whoever squished the most juice out won a festival T-shirt. When it was our turn we did our best but didn't win. It didn't matter - we had a lot of fun doing something we've never done before.

Lake ridge has the bugs worked out of this process - nearby were clean benches to sit on and water facets to hose off our feet. 

The large grassy field was filled with lawn chairs, which we didn't have, but there were a few tables off to the side so we found a place at one of them. Gary treated us to some white wine while we listened to a group called Bobby Brown and the B52s.

We snacked on french fries, too, before wandering over to the Cornhole games. The guys did better than Erin and I did, so they won. I didn't care, I was just amazed that I actually got one in!