Fredericksburg Wine Country

Dawn breaks over a dew-crystallized vineyard. Nearby, the vintner arrives for an early start to the day. In the distance, pickup trucks meander down the ranch-to-market road, greeted by the calls of onlooking cattle and goats.

It’s another day in Texas wine country.

Much of the Lone Star State’s fast-growing wine industry is centered in the Hill Country near Fredericksburg, founded by German settlers who planted the Vitis vinifera grapes that thrived in the Mediterranean climate of their new home. It would be a century before production would begin on a serious scale but the roots of the Texas wine industry had been planted.

This community remembers its Old World heritage with German-style buildings, shops and restaurants. Those roots are also evident at the downtown Fredericksburg Winery (247 West Main Street, 830-990-8747, www.fbgwinery.com), where signature labels like the Texas Chardonnay “Adelsverein” (named for the Society of Noblemen formed by German princes to help emigrants to the newly-formed Republic of Texas) feature artwork and a little history.

Like many local wineries, this is a family-run operation, headed by no-nonsense Cord Switzer (look for the man in the gimme cap), along with his wife Sandy, brothers Jene and Burt, and mother “Oma,” charged with labeling each bottle by hand.

Fourteen miles north of Fredericksburg, you’ll find Bell Mountain Vineyards (463 Bell Mountain Road, 830-685-3297, www.bellmountainwine.com), located in Texas’s first designated winegrowing area, or head east where “bouquet” describes not only wine but wildflowers.

Further east stands Stonewall, home to Lyndon Baines Johnson’s “Texas White House,” and also home to Grape Creek Vineyards (4 miles west of Stonewall on US 290, 830-644-2710, www.grapecreek.com), where acres of climbing vines yield the prize-winning Cabernet Trois.

Nearby, Becker Vineyards (10 miles east of Fredericksburg off US 290, 830-644-2681, www.beckervineyards.com), with 46 acres of French Vinifera vines, boasts Texas’s largest underground wine cellar. It’s filled with specialties such as the 2002 Viognier, an elegant wine with a hint of violets and peach, served at a dinner for Australia’s Prime Minister at President Bush’s Prairie Chapel Ranch, and the 2002 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve, poured at a White House dinner.

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