Every year without fail, for the past six years, my husband and I drive to the Okanagan in the early summer. It's our annual wine buying trip and we look forward to meeting up with friends and family (who drive over the mountains from Calgary), to relaxing and enjoying the sunny weather.
Equally importantly, we go to stock up our wine cellar. To search out the new wineries. To sample new reds, new whites. To check in on the renters in our house. We love the Okanagan so much we bought a house in Peachland which in coming years will serve as our family's recreation property. Eventually we might even retire to our house in the valley.
This trip, we joked about starting up a winery and restaurant in the future. Indeed, every year, someone in the Okanagan is realizing a dream about growing grapes and making the best Pinot or Meritage, the best Chenin or Chardonnay Canada has seen. Every year we visit 8 to 12 of the nearly (or is now over) 100 wineries to sample old favourites or try discover the newest arrival on the scene.
However, the lure of the noble grape has caused no small impact on the valley. The Okanagan was once known for its fruit orchard production, far more than its grape growing properties. That has changed.
Everywhere, orchards have been ripped out to make room for the grape. Wine after all, although a fickle industry that is almost entirely weather dependent, provides much more promise of fame and wealth than an apple, cherry, or peach orchard.
Although themselves imported and cultivated, those fruit trees at least provided a wide variety in produce. Now, as the trees are replaced by row upon row of vines, I wonder if this shift to a mono-culture is doing more harm than good. Personally, I love a good glass of wine. But I also like a peach pie or apple pie at the end of a meal too.
A little of me feels guilty for supporting an industry that is rapidly sweeping another aside. Yet every year I go back.
What do you think? Am I wrong in my guilt?
If loving wine is wrong then I don't wanna be right.
Posted by: Don Mills Diva | June 09, 2009 at 09:53 AM
That's a hard one and I've felt it too. The monoculture thing bothers me a lot and I try to buy from local and diverse farms at the market here. At the same time, there are lots of things I'd rather not give up and need to be brought from far away and such...
I think I lean towards trying to balance out my consumption by supporting local farms and businesses going against the trend (and by supporting I mean forking over cash for what might be slightly more expensive produce). In the end, people will do what they need to do to make money and prosper.
Posted by: RHW | June 14, 2009 at 04:15 PM