Wisconsin the home to Wineries and Lake Lover’s Paradise
WOLLERSHEIM WINERY
Wine lovers around Wisconsin, should definitely plan a lovely afternoon to visit Wollersheim Winery. Enjoy wines and landscape, a place where history, culture and wine-making are interweaving. Located in Sauk City of Wisconsin, about 1 hour 40 min via I-94 W from Milwaukee.
Many studies and historians explain, that once upon a time in the 19th century Sauk City was named Széptáj (in Hungarian), which means Beautiful View. A historical heritage on the top of a small hill overlooking the Wisconsin River.
Basically, the story of the winery goes back to 1840s. It connects to the Haraszthy legend. The Hungarian nobleman Ágoston Haraszthy, known as pioneer winemaker.
The father of California wines, conquered this piece of land of Wisconsin by developing his holdings into a town (Széptáj), establishing a winery, which over the times went through some transformation and still. In spite of all the challenges, today is back to its original function. To read more about its history click here.
A pleasant environment has been created, where visitors and locals can peacefully quench their thirst by a nice glass of wine. Additionally, there is a so called “Central European Wine”, which has been produced by Hungarian grapes.
Gorgeous modern property with the touch of the old world elegance, surrounded with a lot of greenery, which provides a special spectacle to the wine garden.
A pleasant patio overlooking towards the grapevine and the beautifully restored historical stone cave, invites visitors to sit outside at the wrought iron tables, and taste purchased wine, while enjoying the pleasant atmosphere.
Visitors are welcomed to enter (free of cost) the stone cave, which originally has been carved by Ágoston Haraszthy in 1840s. Recently restored cave’s semi circled entrance invites all aged individuals to enter and find out more about the history of this place. On the left and right side of the cave, there are placed big printed posters, which describe the different family eras and explain the roots and origins of Wollersheim Winery.
A key point to remember, visitors need to sign up in advance for the wine tour. If for some reason you miss the tour, you can savor some wines in the modern and stylishly designed tasting room, with sensibly good variety of wines.
Good wines for Initial tasting are complimentary, additional wines have a small fee of $5. Staff is very friendly, smiley and happy to explain to wine lovers the characteristics of the wine which they are serving.
Don’t forget to check out the gift shop before leaving this fabulous place. You can find all kind of interesting goods related to the wines.
All things considered, I highly recommend this place to visit and enjoy it with five senses.
LAKE GENEVA
Post treating my taste buds with amazing collection of wines, I started my journey on US – 12 E towards Lake Geneva. This is around 100 miles away from Wollersheim Winery and took me around 2 hours to reach there.
Lake Geneva a resort city, located on Geneva Lake, the perfect place to spend the rest of the day. I was totally charmed by the individual houses along the lake side and little further inside, converted into souvenir shops, art galleries, designer boutiques, café shops and a lot more.
Lake side is full of water sport activities, lake cruises, restaurants and bars with their own specialty foods and bar menu. The visit to Delaney Street Mercantile home décor and gift shop was a refreshing experience with their amazing collection of artifacts, gift items and lamp shades in various shapes and sizes collected from various parts of world.
Moving around Geneva Village shops with the street full of beautiful houses turned to specialty shops is an absolute delight and attracts the shopping appetite.
There are multiple beaches along the long stretch of Lake. Perfect to unwind and take out swim suits in summer time, while whole lot of water sports activities are available.
You may like to explore Riviera Beach, Big Foot beach state park or simply walk around the Lake Shore Path with it’s amazing views of the lake, magnificent houses and great hiking experience. Lot of this path is surrounded by private properties, hence do watch out to remain in public area during the hike.
With all the walking and exploring places, time now to engage taste buds again in the scenic beach side chain of restaurants. I picked Oakfire pizza restaurant with it’s neat nautical ambience, roof top restaurant, great variety of Italian food and drinks, with large portions.
Watching sun go down towards the lake side and hiding behind the land on the other side was refreshing and that’s when I decided to move back and start preparing myself for another incursion, details of which I shall share in my next blog.
