{"id":369,"date":"2012-10-16T19:17:49","date_gmt":"2012-10-17T02:17:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/danthewineguy.com\/?p=369"},"modified":"2012-10-30T19:27:56","modified_gmt":"2012-10-31T02:27:56","slug":"artisan-wine-gallery-a-great-place-to-visits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/?p=369","title":{"rendered":"Artisan Wine Gallery a Great Place To Visit While on Lummi Island"},"content":{"rendered":"

Washingtonians know that we live in a fairly spectacular little corner of the world. And in the northwest corner of that little corner, Whatcom County is home to a diverse, vibrant population, stunning natural resources and excellent opportunities for wine tasting. <\/p>\n

You just knew I was going to fit the wine tasting thing in there, didn\u2019t you?<\/p>\n

A few weeks ago I took the 10-minute ferry ride to Lummi Island and spent the afternoon at an absolute gem of a wine shop, the Artisan Wine Gallery<\/strong>. With a good selection of wines in a serene setting, it offers wine enthusiasts a perfect day-trip getaway from nearby cities on the mainland.<\/p>\n

Husband and wife proprietors Rich Frye and Pat Hayes started their one-of-a-kind wine\/art establishment in 2005 and it\u2019s evolved into a great meeting place for locals and friendly stop-in spot for vacationers and people like me who should make the trek from Bellingham more often.<\/p>\n

Rich has been an acquaintance of mine for several years and his knowledgeable yet laid-back approach to wines is both refreshing and perfectly suited to unruffled island life. As a recent retiree, he\u2019s been travelling a bit more to Europe to do some firsthand tasting and is even considering starting an online store and wine club at the Gallery.<\/p>\n

\"null\"Although the wine shop is small, it houses an excellent variety of extremely affordable domestic and international choices, many in the $9 to $15-a-bottle price range.<\/p>\n

An example of the assortment of wines you\u2019ll find include those I sampled (for a nominal $5 tasting fee) during my visit. A lean, appley Chilean Marquest de Casa Concha 2009 Chardonnay<\/strong> ($15) started things off, followed by a L\u2019Hortus 2011 Ros\u00e9 de Saignee <\/strong>($17) with accents of tart, dried cherry and a Monte Oton 2010 Garnacha <\/strong>(pictured at left, $9), with huge raspberry aromas and spicy black cherry flavors at an unbeatable price. An excellent Masquerade 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Troika <\/strong>($22) was the perfect final\u00e9, with notes of black plum and chocolate on the soft finish.<\/p>\n

After a stop at the Beach Store Caf\u00e9 for dinner, my return trip on a glass-like Lummi Bay featured a full moon just above Mount Baker to the east and magenta-fringed clouds on the western sunset. Washingtonians know that it doesn\u2019t get much better than that.<\/p>\n

Artisan Wine Gallery is open from 4 to 7 pm Friday, 2 to 6 pm Saturday, \u201canytime for wine emergencies,\u201d and during the upcoming Lummi Island Artists Studio Tour scheduled for November 10 and 11. More information: artisanwineclub.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Washingtonians know that we live in a fairly spectacular little corner of the world. And in the northwest corner of that little corner, Whatcom County is home to a diverse, vibrant population, stunning natural resources and excellent opportunities for wine tasting. You just knew I was going to fit the wine tasting thing in there, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-bellingham-herald"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=369"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":374,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369\/revisions\/374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}