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Crowd swells at wine festival
Weather helps draw 26,500 to Tanglewood
Journal Photo by Bruce Chapman
Waiting in one of the "sweet wine" lines at Thistle Meadow Winery's booth are (from left) Harmon Hinton, Carolyn Rose, Walter Riggsbee, and Linda Lambert.
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Published: May 31, 2009
The sky was blue, the weather was warm and the wine was flowing.
Tanglewood Park was filled with wine lovers yesterday during the 9th Annual North Carolina Wine Festival. This year's attendance was about 26,500, beating last year's record of 20,000, said Tom Hamilton, the festival director.
"We ran out of places to park cars," he said. "We've never had that dilemma before."
Among the patrons were Phil and Julia McManus, who moved to Eagle Rock, Va., in 2005 but come back each year for the festival.
"This is where we started liking local wines," Phil McManus said. "We've been coming here for the last six years."
They stay with friends here each May for the festival, then return the favor in September during a similar festival that is held near Roanoke.
The gates were scheduled to open at noon, but they opened a few minutes early to accommodate the sea of people who had gathered by then.
"The line starts back there, folks -- way back!" a volunteer called out to discourage line breakers as people began streaming in, many of them carrying folding chairs, coolers and tents.
Behind the vendor's booths, more than 20 groups of people had set up tents, forming a makeshift tent city where they could enjoy the wine, warm weather and music.
Lori Sykes was one of a group of four friends who brought a tent. She is a Winston-Salem native, but this was her first year at the festival. "It's nice," she said. "I'm anxious to try some new wines."
She was impressed by the fact that there were other vendors, and not just wineries. The booths included arts and crafts, hot sauces, food, a satellite-TV service, and even a fortune teller.
Sykes' friend Michelle Idol, who described herself as a "wine connoisseur," said she has been coming to the festival for the last four or five years.
"The set-up is perfect -- where you taste and go, taste and go," she said. She found last year's heat "miserable," she said, but she was expecting a much more pleasant experience yesterday with the tent in place. The group had folding chairs and large coolers with food and bottled water. They even brought their own cheese tray.
"You can't have wine without cheese," said Patrick Russell, another member of the group, .
Winery owners said that the festival is an important way for them to meet customers and get them to sample their wines.
"I don't miss a year," said Terry Crater, the owner of Buck Shoals Vineyard in Hamptonville. He sets up at four regional wine festivals each year, but said that if he had to choose only one, this would be it.
Tom Burgiss, the owner of Thistle Meadow Winery in Laurel Springs, said that the festival had helped his winery grow in popularity over the years. "It helped us get a start," he said. Thistle Meadow's offerings were so popular this year that it had set up five separate lines for different types of wine.
There were 38 wineries represented at this year's festival, each offering samples from a variety of wines they have to offer.
Some of them also set up at the Salute! wine festival in downtown Winston-Salem, which was held on May 9. The two festivals don't appear to be distracting from each other; Salute! also had a record-setting turnout this year, drawing about 7,500 people, a 15 percent increase over a year ago.
Hamilton attributed yesterday's growth in attendance to various factors, including increased awareness of the festival, the popularity of the performing musical acts such as Chairmen of the Board, and the fact that so many wineries were on hand.
McManus said he enjoyed meeting the winemakers and talking with them about their craft. Attending the festival in past years has led him and his wife to visit wineries and learn more about wine.
The chance to sample so many different wines in one place is another benefit, McManus added.
"Once you get a profile of what you like, it's easier to know what to ask for," he said.
■ Tim Clodfelter can be reached at 727-7371 or at tclodfelter@wsjournal.com.
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