Grape harvest calls for a game of bocce!

While living in the California wine country, Mother Nature’s habitual tendencies became intrinsic motivators in our lives. We’d see the fuzzy little bud break on the first warm spring day, anticipate the coastal fog that would blanket the vineyards during the summer every six days like clockwork, observe our beloved chocolate Labrador Retriever quietly plucking berries off the vines. “Kona!”  Oh, how we loved that dog! We’d recognize the telltale rise of steam emanating from piles of fermenting pomace during…

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San Leonardo Estate: Aristocratic finesse and the rhythms of life

Tenuta San Leonardo is cradled in a sliver of geography where the gentle vastness of the Veneto rises to the dramatic Dolomites at the southern edge of Trentino. This majestic corner of the world is also home to one of Italy’s most unapologetically artisanal wines. Yet, not far outside the hamlet walls of San Leonardo, the sub-Alpine region is dotted with abandoned stone buildings along the Adige River, which remind of a time when Italians scrambled amid the din of…

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Daou’s Seeds of Hope

For brothers Daniel and Georges Daou of Daou Vineyards, the desire to find happiness was a result of a near-death experience. At the tender age of 10 and 14, they fled their homeland during the Lebanese civil war after a bomb hit their home. Yet, the times of rubble also marked the beginning of a life that they would learn to love … and share. “Not only did it create a desire to be happy, but it created a bond between…

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