Vestal Wine And Liquor Travel Blog

The Great Flood of 2011

admin — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 02:02:27 +0000

Just when you think your ship has come in, life takes a sudden turn for the worst. The time frame was the first week of September. We were eagerly awaiting the opening of Aldis grocery store and the added business that it would generate, then the rains began. Hurricane Irene primed the rivers and streams with 2 to 4 inches of rain. Then the remnants of Hurricane Earl began his assault. Between 8 and 12 inches drenched our area in 24 hours, a quarter of our yearly average rainfall. The results were not surprising, devastating flash flooding followed by record river flooding caused massive destruction. Our neighbors to the West in Owego were virtually wiped of the map. Here at 4 corners, we thought we had made it through the worst. While our parking lot partially flooded, the stores were high an dry. The river had crested and began to drop, I figured we had made it through and planned to open the store in the morning. Instead, water began flooding into the plaza. Come to find out that the levee behind our plaza was overtopped and pumps failed. We frantically moved up all the product we could and sandbagged the doors. While this effort helped immensely, a foot and a half inundated the store. We lost 23k in product and the store was destroyed. As soon as we could with an army of friends, family and customers, we emptied the store in 3 days and put all of the salvable product into secure storage. From the bad comes the good, our landlord, Ramour and Flannigan, then came and put a beautiful brand new store in for us. I invested in new shelving and computers and thus began our climb back up the hill to recovery. One solid week of 16hr days and the store was filled with product and we were ready for business. On October 28th, after almost 2 months of being-closed, we reopened for business. Our first week open, I didn’t know what to expect but the support from the community has been amazing. The lesson for all businesses is when you treat your customers well through the years, they will return. Its not always about price, its about the relationship you form with customers which keeps them coming back in no matter what. Recouping the losses will-take years but we are off to a good start. There are may business through the area that will never reopen and we are greatful to have an opportunity to make a go of it again.

Road Trip

admin — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 16:43:27 +0000

I love when my brother and sister in-laws come to into town, I can get away with stuff that would usually lead to divorce. For example, I took my brother and sister in-law to the Maroon 5 concert and rolled in at 4 in the morning and the only thing she asked was if I had a good time. Going to try to get away with the strip joint next time their in town! Anyway, I was charged with providing entertainment for the entire day on Monday, so my thoughts turned immediately to a road trip to wine country. So early Monday morning, we fired up the convertible and off we went to Cayuga Lake. First of all, you can say what you want about NYS, but the scenery is beautiful. The only fly in the ointment is navigating Ithaca, NY. Lets see, there is route 96, 96a, 96b, 79, 79E, 79, 89, 13a and 34 and they all converge in downtown Ithaca. As many years as I have been going up three, I still get dazed and confused. Once you find your way to route 89, the views are outstanding as the road rises along the lake shore. Our first stop of the day was Thirsty Owl Winery. I haven’t been to the winery in many years and I was amazed at the growth. They have a new beautiful tasting room and excellent food out on the deck overlooking the lake. They have award winning wines that run the gauntlet from sweet to suprisingly good dry reds such as their Pinot Noir and Meritage. I highly recommend their Dry Riesling, Chardonnay and Diamond. We got the retailers bonus and got to taste wine out of the barrels with the wine make, really cool! Next we walked over to Cayuga Ridge Winery. Firstly, their tasting area is inside an old barn and is about as rustic and cool as it gets. Their flagships are Cranberry and Peach flavored wines, these are no brainers for summer entertaining. I was also highly impressed with their Rieslings which just received gold medals. Beside wine, they have local cheeses and other neat gifts and souvenirs. Time flies and we only had time for one more stop, so we finished up at Sheldrake Point Winery which won Winery of the Year accolades. Sheldrake has a beautiful tasting room of course stocked with lots of award winning wines. I highly recommend their Rieslings, luckystone White and Waterfall Chardonnay. We finished up the day with a memorable dinner out on the lawn at Sheldrake, perfect! Lesson here, you don’t to travel to Napa to experience wine country, its right here in your own backyard.

Time Off

admin — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 18:33:18 +0000

I apologize for neglecting the travel blog and website in general, we have been busy anticipating the arrival of our 4th child. Elliot was born a healthy boy on 1/11/11! Now it is back to work, website has been updated and look for a new post soon!

Chi Town

admin — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 16:27:07 +0000

We just completed our yearly trip to Chicago to visit my sister in law. This year, I realized that the person sitting next to me on the trip (my wife) also knows how to drive. So instead of suffering through the entire 12 hour trip myself, my wife split the drive with me.  I actually arrived chipper with no caffeine induced hangover. Since this is a trip for the kids to visit with their cousin, there wasn’t much time to engage in drinking, however we did sneak in a few memorable wines.
     If you are a steak lover, then eating at Harry Caray’s Legendary Steak House is a must . There are 3 of them in the Greater Chicago area, we ate at the one in Lombard, IL. They specialize in fantastic dry aged steaks. Even my wife who boarders on vegetarianism at times thoroughly enjoyed hers. Always looking to try new wines, I picked out J.Lohrs Los Oso Merlot. I was very impressed, smooth and silky with enough grip to handle the rib eye, we both loved the wine. I am now carrying in at the store, great buy for $13.89.
      I always like to bring something form the wine cellar, this year I brought Beringer’s Private Selection 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon. You can say all you want about the great bargins in wine out there, but there is simply no substitute for a fantastic $100 bottle of Beringer California Cabernet. We had this wine with steaks and it simply blew us all away. Incredibly complex but at the same time perfectly balanced it was truly one of the great wines I have tasted, unfortunately very hard to find but totally worth it if you stumble across it.  We also sipped on some Kendall Jackson Chard and Chateau St. Jean Cabernet during the week. These  are workhorse wines for me at the store and I haven’t had either of these wines in a long time. I enjoyed both, they represent great values and over-deliver for the price, good every day drinkers.
     Finally for some quick must sees in Chi Town, check out the Science Museum and take the U-505 sub tour, simply amazing! Check out the Children’s Museum in Dekalb, kept the kids busy for the entire day, play golf at  White Pines Golf Course in Bensenville, nice 36 hole layout & reasonably priced ($50 with cart) & finally if your traveling into Chicago, take the Metra! Nice, quick clean train ride from virtually any western suburb that the kids will love!

Fingerlakes Wedding

admin — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 15:30:51 +0000

My wife and I had the recent pleasure of taking a beautiful road trip up to Belhurst Castle in Geneva, NY for a friends wedding. It is has been years since I have been up to the Finger Lakes region and after this trip, I am asking myself why? For one, it is hard to find a more scenic drive then up route 14 along Seneca lake. We took my recent mid-life crisis 2002 Camaro Convertible and it was a truly pleasurable drive with the top town. There are tons of wineries to stop at. On the way up, we stopped at Fox Run Winery for lunch. Food & wine were delicious as we sat outback on their beautifully landscaped patio, no crowds around, quite and peaceful.
     Belhurst Castle is a famous Fingerlakes Landmark. We were a little hesitant about staying there due to a good amount of negative reviews on some of the travel sites. However, our room was in the new section of the property. They have recently added a 6 million dollars addition called Vinifera Inn which contains new rooms, spa and catering hall. Our room was very nice, huge hot tub & very comfortable although a little pricey at $300 per night. The wedding ceremony and cocktail hour was outside right along the lake and very nicely done. The dinner & dancing was in their new hall, food was decent and we all had a good time.   All in all, it was a nice experience at Belhurst and certainly didn’t reflect the negative reviews.
     The next day, we had breakfast at Geneva on the Lake where we got engaged many moons ago. It may have been the most expensive breakfast we have ever had, but the food and scenery out on their Greek revival patio are exquisite. No trip up to Seneca is complete without a stop at Watkins Glen State Park. This 2 mile, relatively easy hike up the gorge is unbelievable. Waterfalls and unparalleled scenery reinforces just how many beautiful natural features we have in NY. My wife who is an aspiring photographer took so many pictures I though her camera was going to overheat! We finished off the day at Castle Grisch Winery which is located just outside Watkins Glen. This winery sits on top of the mountain and the views are spectacular. We sat on their outside deck eating excellent home cooking, sipping wine as we watched a storm roll up through the valley below, perfect! Skip the trip to Napa and check out the Finger Lakes for excellent wine, food and scenery right in your own backyard.