Ken & Kai's Winery Tour, August 2000. Well, I'm sure that there are much better wines in the GOZILLIONS of wineries around the Finger Lakes, but I doubt many of them put on as entertaining a show as the Bully Hill Winery tourguides do! We were warned that they are the "Cheech and Chong" of the wineries, and that description isn't far off. I saw them as the hippies and anarchists of the area with great disdain for corporate America. We learned that for the last five generations, the Bully Hill Winery has been owned and operated by the Taylor family. Yes, that's Taylor as in Taylor Wines BUT a corporate acquisition of the Taylor name by Coca-Cola in the 1970's forbids family members to use the Taylor name on any of their products, whether wine-related or not, including all of the rather prolific artwork that Walter S. Tayl*r creates. Well, lemme tell ya... this name thing STILL doesn't sit well with the family! As a sign of protest, Walter S. Tayl*r created "Love My Goat" wine whose motto is that "You've gotten my name, but you won't get my goat!" As you can imagine, this pissed off the legal department at Coca-Cola and they took Walt to court again-and-again-and-again, and even went so far as to complain about the tongue that sticks out of the goat's mouth. (Walt's artwork, of course!) "He's sticking his tongue out at US!" the lawyers protested. "No, he's not," replied Walter S. "He's licking his lips!" So if you pick up multiple vintages of "Love My Goat" wine, you'll notice the tongue is repositioned each year to circle his mouth. So the guide showed us the vineyards, the grape squishers, the fermentation tanks, the bottle fillers, the label-sticker-on'ers, the cork-stuffer-in'ers and the big thunderstorm rumbling to our north, and then we went inside to taste the wines. Mmmmmmmm! Now, some people have allergic reactions (just like to MSG in Chinese food) to the chemicals that some other wine companies put in their wines but Bully Hill doesn't put any of that crap in their wines. They also don't use real-cork corks in their wines. I'm sure their main reason is cost, but they claim that they are more environmentally friendly by not increasing the demand for the rapidly depleting cork supply. They also say that the synthetic corks don't break up and leave debris when they're yanked. They don't promote bacterial growth like natural cork, or impart foul-tasting chemicals like treated cork. Nor do they leak... not wine out, but air IN! Because then the wine would turn to vinegar. That's why wine is traditionally stored on its side... so the cork doesn't dry and leak air. But I digress... we tasted a bunch of their wines (pity we couldn't indulge ourselves with more than just a few sips of each, but we were riding) and most of them were quite tasty! Our wines of choice were the Equinox line... both red and white. Neither were too dry/heavy or too sweet to go with dinner. FINE wines they weren't, but tasty nonetheless! Check the whole Bully Hill line out at your local liquor store. They're inexpensive enough to try several at a time and perform your own wine tastings at home. Though Jaime and Denise had raved about the WONDERFUL restaurant at the Bully Hill Winery, they seemed overwhelmed by the half-full capacity crowd. The hostess ran around like a chicken without a head, stressed to the max, and did everything BUT seat any of us lined up at the door so we lost our patience and motored Northward. We hoped that the big thunderstorm we had heard earlier had rumbled its way far enough north that we'd miss it. No, looked like we were gonna catch the edge of it, but we were hopeful as we turned away from what we thought was its reach. We caught a rather refreshing smattering of rain, and things looked pretty clear up ahead so we didn't stop to don our rain gear. Big mistake. The road curved into the storm and we got DRENCHED in a downpour. By that time it was too late. No sense in putting rubber suits over our WET clothes so we rode on and eventually passed through the isolated T-storm. Only 20-30 miles later, we were nearly dry when we arrived back at the rally campground. The Finger Lakes Rally is a delightful one! Great people! High quality food! And onsite cabins (and many nearby hotels/motels/B&B's) for those of us who no longer enjoy sleeping on the ground. Beemer rallies have always been my favorites because the attendees are the least pretentious and they have the most miles under their belts. Roads in the Finger Lakes region aren't particularly challenging... twistie-turnies are few and far between as you cross gently rolling fields and pasturelands... but the scenery is quite picturesque. Won't you join us next year? ~Kai The Pocono Kids: -Kai & Ken ----- -@ \ ----- -@ -- =-[ \,) --- =-/\,) (*)Z>(*) - (*)>(*)