{"id":8008,"date":"2016-05-01T10:19:07","date_gmt":"2016-05-01T16:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8008"},"modified":"2016-05-01T10:19:07","modified_gmt":"2016-05-01T16:19:07","slug":"celebrating-spring-red-rocks-and-wine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8008","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating Spring, Red Rocks, and Wine"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Bennett

Bennett Price, founder of DeBeque Canyon winery in Palisade, Colo,, samples a cask with a wine thief.<\/p><\/div>\n

I look outside today and see a white landscape, with light snow falling and a couple of hungry humingbirds huddled on the sugar-water feeder like barflies staring into their whiskey glasses.<\/p>\n

Yes, it’s a typical May Day in the Colorado foothills. Is any surprise that Colorado’s biggest public Beltane festival<\/a> does not occur until the 19th\u201322nd of May? They tried at first to do it on the “correct” date, but they learned their lesson.<\/p>\n

Next weekend is the 76th Music and Blossom Festival <\/a>in the southern Colorado town of Ca\u00f1on City, not too far from me. Everyone knows, as a friend said last week, that “Blossom Weekend will be either snowing or a hundred degrees.” He forgot to mention the time in the 1990s when a hailstorm hit the parade.<\/p>\n

But attending would be a way to “let the polis support your Paganism,” a theme that I have played with here <\/a>and here<\/a> this year.<\/p>\n

So I will back up to the spring equinox, whose theme is usually “Let’s thaw out a little before the snow returns.” Some years that means a run to the desert, such as Canyonlands National Park<\/a>. This year, it was Colorado National Monument.<\/a> Red rock and sunshine, that’s the thing. Yay, Wingate Formation!<\/p>\n

And wine. The vineyards were leafing, barely, whenM. and I dropped in at a couple of favorite Western Slope wineries in early April, of which our most favorite is DeBeque Canyon. (Yes, like the organizers of Beltania, we postponed the date a little.)<\/p>\n

The trend today is for wineries to become venues<\/em>. I think of one winery in Sonoma that I visited as a hitchhiking college student in the 1970s, on my way from Portland to San Francisco. I remembered it as a collection of sheds and little barefoot girls in cotton dresses running in the dust \u2014 my friend and I bought a jug of “Dago red” and took it up to the ruined hot springs that Lake Sonoma <\/a>later drowned.<\/p>\n

I returned to the same winery in 2007. Unrecognizable. There was an art gallery, meeting, space, an elegant tasting room that looked like a hotel bar . . . all glassed-in and air-conditioned. Other wineries compete with gardens and fountains and views \u2014 that is happening in Colorado too.<\/p>\n

Not at DeBeque Canyon, not yet. You bump over the railroad tracks in Palisade to a collection of industrial metal buildings. There is Bennett Price, the owner, behind a simple counter pouring excellent wines for tasting, and telling stories of the industry’s beginnings in the 1970s. He seems to know everyone<\/em> in the trade from Denver to San Francisco.<\/p>\n

Slightly buzzed, we cross the parking lot in the strong spring sun, arms full of bottles. Yes, spring will be returning even to our foothills home. But first the spring snows will arrive to saturate the land.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I look outside today and see a white landscape, with light snow falling and a couple of hungry humingbirds huddled on the sugar-water feeder like barflies staring into their whiskey glasses. Yes, it’s a typical May Day in the Colorado foothills. Is any surprise that Colorado’s biggest public Beltane festival does not occur until the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[23,64,244,281],"class_list":["post-8008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-colorado","tag-equinox","tag-spring","tag-wine"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-25a","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12453,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12453","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":0},"title":"Wines for Esotericists","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 25, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"What has been happening over at the Winery at Holy Cross Abbey, down in Ca\u00f1on City, Colorado? They have gone hermetic! M. and I celebrated equinox season today by attending the winery's Harvest Festival. It was packed. SInce the focus is on wine, many attendees turned it into a picnic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/the-alchemist-wine-239x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4198,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4198","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":1},"title":"It’s Time for my Winter Coat . . .","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 12, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":". . . at the Beltania festival, where the temperature is about 45\u00b0 F with rain now and again. I spent the morning at one of the volunteer fire department's monthly training day, helping more people become familiar with the whole process of drafting water from a\u00a0 creek (hydrants? we\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6611,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6611","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":2},"title":"Beltania Festival Moves Closer to the Capitol","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 21, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"It was nice while it lasted, having a Pagan festival near enough that, if my schedule was too crowded, I could at least buy a day pass and hear the best concerts. Not any more. Beltania is pulling out of District 12* (where the coal miners once toiled) and moving\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"Maypole procession 2011 (Photo by Robin Vinehall).","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/maypole4-crystalize.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/maypole4-crystalize.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/maypole4-crystalize.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":13249,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13249","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":3},"title":"The Snow Geese of Candlemas","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 19, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"I am all for seasonal rituals, but there is also a place for celebrating the Turning of the Wheel with your larger community, your polis, taking a local event and giving it a Pagan spin. The solstices are easy: there is always something going on. Samhain \u2014 too many choices!\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"birds\"","block_context":{"text":"birds","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=birds"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/snow-geese-UDWR.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/snow-geese-UDWR.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/snow-geese-UDWR.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/snow-geese-UDWR.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":720,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=720","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":4},"title":"Autumn tumbles in","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 17, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"M. and I came home last evening from Colorado Springs, and then we got involved with an unexpected refrigerator problem. (Temporarily fixed, but I think it is time to go shopping.) Meanwhile, we forgot to cover some outdoor plants.Meanwhile, the temperature dropped: Bye-bye, yellow squash and zucchini, bye-bye to the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3261,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3261","url_meta":{"origin":8008,"position":5},"title":"It’s Mabon, so … canta y no llores","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 24, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"My approach to the eight-festival Pagan calendar works like this: the cross-quarter days are for ritual\u2014be that outdoor bonfires or black candles at midnight. The quarter days\u2014solstices and equinoxes\u2014are for public and communal celebrations: with the whole public, not just with other Pagans. The fall equinox offers choice of harvest\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/MarquezBros-300x293.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8008"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8008\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8016,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8008\/revisions\/8016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}