Sabin Wine Journeys - the Virginia Wine Journeys Blog

December 19, 2025.   While it’s not by design, we visited several old Virginia wineries this year that have embarked on new chapters in their lives.   Oakencroft outside of Charlottesville is under new management with new construction and re-purposed original infrastructure (April 2025).   There was Shenandoah Vineyards in Edinburg, which began in 1976 but whose future as a working vineyard under its current owner is uncertain (July 2025). Naked Mountain Winery and Vineyards is another old Virginia winery – operating handsomely in Markham, Fauquier County, since it opened in 1982.   Former owners Bob and Phoebe Harper first planted vines in 1976 and added acreage in 1980 and 1994.   In 2010, the Harper’s retired from the wine trade and sold Naked Mountain to Randy and Meagan Morgan.                                                    ...

April 12, 2025.   On our way back to Charlottesville, we decided to stop at Lovingston Winery south and west of the town of Lovingston off Route 29 in Nelson County.   Wes Roberts, his wife Tessa Riley and her parents, Bill and Shelley Riley, purchased Lovingston Winery from the Puckett Family in 2021 and with it a winery that originally opened to the public in 2003 and Josie’s Knoll Vineyard, named after Josie Stevens, whose family resided here back in the early 1900’s.   Lovingston Winery occupies a nice new barn amid the rolling foothills of the Blue Ridge range.   You will drive past a barn and farmhouse area and then past the tasting room to parking in the rear.   The farmhouse used to be the tasting room when the Puckett’s owned the winery.   Now it can be rented for overnight stays and the barn is the tasting room.   Inside the new barn is one open room which would be dark if the sliding barn doors were closed.   A fireplace sits at o...

May 25, 2024.   Hello Readers!   It has been a while since we last posted.   We have been doing some traveling out of state, but we’re back!   We used a warm morning on the Memorial Day weekend to revisit one of the great Virginia wineries with some friends – Linden Vineyards - which is a few minutes south of the crossroads that constitute the town of Linden in western Fauquier County.   During our visit we spoke with owner and founder, Jim Law, and his son-in law, Alex Wilde, who poured for us.   Thanks to both of them for their time.   Much has been written about Linden over the years, and much by Jim Law himself.   A native of Ohio, Jim got a start in agriculture in the 1970’s when he served as an agricultural volunteer with the Peace Corps in Africa.   He loved working with fruit crops and on returning to the States, with wine and growing grapes.   His first experiences in the grape field came in Indiana but there was no mark...