Ready to sample some wines with altitude? El Dorado’s Fair Play appellation, which lies south of Placerville, is defined by its 2,500-foot mountain elevations. Neighboring Camino sits at an even higher altitude — up to 3,500 feet. Each region’s vintners make a wide variety of wines, so there’s something to please just about every palate from these family-owned boutique wineries. Here’s just a sampling to get you started.
Fair Play wineries
Cedarville Vineyard: Silicon Valley refugees Jonathan Lachs and Susan Marks’ escape from high tech led them in the 1990s to Fair Play, where they purchased land and planted grapes for Cedarville Vineyard. There are no employees, no vineyard management company here — it’s just the two of them, aging wine in “caves” made from precast modular concrete units, like the type you’d find in highway overpasses, installed into an excavated hillside. The units even have arched ceilings, evoking a real cave.
Unconventional? Yes, but that’s fitting for Lachs, who crushes his grenache by foot and bottles unfiltered viognier.
The day of our visit, the gregarious Lachs was pouring wine from bottles adorned with handmade woodcut illustrations of the estate vineyards.
The sips: Lachs’ Viognier ($22) is delightful, with expressive aromas of jasmine, lush peach and honey and lively minerality from decomposed granite soils. Lachs says inspiration for the The Rules of Fair Play ($36), a zinfandel and petite sirah blend, comes from the tale of a Gold Rush-era gun battle. To avert impending doom, someone shouted, “The rules of fair play apply here,” and stopped the duel. That’s how the town of Fair Play — and this delicious blend — got its name.
Details: Open by appointment. 6320 Marestail Road, Somerset; www.cedarvillevineyard.com.
Nearby: Make a day of it by stopping at some of the other Fair Play wineries, including Miraflores, a 54-acre estate planted with 40 acres of vineyards with a Provencal-inspired ocher stucco tasting room. Try the crisp, juicy Estate Rosé ($21) or the smoky, lleathery and peppery Miraflores Estate Zinfandel ($30). Open daily at 2120 Four Springs Trail, Placerville; www.mirafloreswinery.com.
At Holly’s Hill Vineyards, Rhone varietals pair with stunning Sierra foothills views. Sip the creamy and floral Roussanne ($20) or the flagship Patriarche ($32), a red Rhone blend with lush black fruit and herbal notes. Open daily at 3680 Leisure Lane, Placerville; www.hollyshill.com.
Camino wineries
Madrona Vineyards: This family-owned winery cultivates a dizzying array of more than two dozen varietals from three estate vineyards, one on the orchard-dotted hills of Camino and two in Pleasant Valley. The winery and low-slung tasting room are surrounded by estate vineyards and tucked under a canopy of tall trees.
Woodsy accents dominate in the tasting room, where the walls and ceiling are paneled with cedar and the tasting bar is gleaming pine. Madrona gets its name from a 300 to 400-year-old madrone tree that stands solo in the winery’s Madrona vineyard.
The winery changes up tasting menu wines frequently, offering everything from riesling, merlot and syrah to Portuguese varietal blends. There’s a range of vintages, too, from the current 2014 and 2013 harvests to 2009 library wines.
The sips: Don’t be alarmed when your first pour is a jammy zinfandel. They like to shake things up, moving from reds to whites and back to reds. The Signature Cabernet Franc ($22) has enticing tart black cherry and pomegranate fruit notes, with herbal sage and pepper spice aromas. We loved the juicy Barbera and Barbera Rosé ($24), with plum and strawberry notes and a spicy finish. Both are from Madrona’s new Rucksack Cellars project, which focuses on Sierra foothills appellation vineyards.
The details: Open daily at 2560 High Hill Road, Camino; www.madronavineyards.com.
Nearby: Make a day of it with a stop at Placerville’s Boeger Winery, which sits on a homestead site where a winery, cellar and distillery operated in the 1850s. Head here for refreshing, honeyed White Riesling ($13) and cabernet franc with black cherry, cranberry, sage and anise spice notes. Open daily at 1709 Carson Road, Placerville; www.boegerwinery.com.
Picnic on the patio and enjoy sips in the tasting room at Grace Patriot Wines, which was named for a Revolutionary War soldier. Top tastes include the award-winning Cabernet Sauvignon ($30) and the lush Fashionably Late ($18) dessert wine made from riesling, moscato and gerwurztraminer. Open Wednesday-Sunday at 2701 Carson Road, Placerville; www.gracepatriotwines.com.
