I held my breath when I opened the email that would tell me where in Japan I would spend the next year of my life. When I knew I'd been accepted into the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program (JET), I filled out a paper asking for my requested areas. But heavily bolded type told me in no uncertain terms that I shouldn't expect actually to be placed in those areas. I'd requested Okinawa, Tokyo, and I think Osaka, maybe, I can't even remember now. All I knew when I clicked open that email is that I wanted to be in a large city, or I wouldn't go at all. I couldn't fathom the miserable existence that living rurally would be.
I opened the email, and there it was: Yamato, Hikari City, Yamaguchi, Japan.
An extensive google search finally yielded some information: it was more rural than western Nebraska, more country than Georgia, more rice fields than people.
It took a lot of thought and friends talking some sense into me to accept the placement and go. After all my stubbornness, it took me all of 5 minutes to be hopelessly, desperately enamored of Yamato, the tiny village that was my own. I loved Yamato so fiercely that Hikari felt huge to me. I'd trundle down the mountainside in my 4-door car that was bigger than the roads, and plop out onto the main highway through Hikari, and there were people and cars and shops and restaurants and a grocery store every which way. Hikari began to feel like a city to me. Hiroshima might have been Manhattan, and don't get me started on how actively I avoided Tokyo and Osaka.
In that year in Japan, I found myself gravitating towards the small places that don't get written up in guidebooks, the ones that feel like I found them all by myself and then could share them with the people who've spent their lives there. I valued the beauty of the countryside above urban skylines. I found myself peacefully at home in the middle of absolutely nowhere.
That love of rolling hills and rice fields and stunning landscapes has stayed with me these last three years in DC. And three years! I haven't lived somewhere this long since I was a child. DC is every bit home to me as Yamato was, but whereas I lived to travel and then return to Yamato, in DC I live to thrive in this city and then get the hell out of it.
That's why Virginia wineries appeal so much to me. That Virginia land, so lush and fertile and huge and rolling and expansive - it takes me back to a place in myself that is the most content and relaxed I've ever been.
A few weeks ago, Zander and I pulled up to Delaplane Cellars in Delaplane, Virginia, and I don't think I've been as awestruck at a rural view since the first time I stepped foot in Yamato. It took me 20 minutes to make my way from the car into the winery, situated atop a hill, because I couldn't stop snapping photos. The vines nearly touched the mountains beyond them, and the air hung gray and fit the scene just right, and a picture perfect white house posed for me.
Inside, floor-to-ceiling windows covered the modern tasting room. A wrap-around tasting bar was packed; it wasn't a surprise - Delaplane has made an impressive name for itself with an impressive array of wines. Betsy, one half of the couple that owns Delaplane, greeted us warmly. She offered us a taste of a few reserve wines, on top of the tasting we did. Williams Gap is a 2010 blend that is one of the top Virginia reds I've tasted. It's meant to be aged. Of the five wines on the tasting menu, we enjoyed (and purchased) the 2012 Rose, a French style rose that's a blend of Merlot, Cabernet Franc, and Cabernet Sauvignon. I got pear, a little strawberry, and a refreshing acidity on the finish. With no residual sugar, it was right up my alley. We also loved the 2011 Cinq3 - a blend of five red varieties. We stayed to take in the view and some live music with a glass of wine each, and I soaked it every second of being somewhere rustic and enchantingly beautiful.
I live for our treks out to wine country and escapes to Shenandoah National Park and road trips to Charlottesville. I breathe in that fresh mountain air and turn to Zander and say that if we're looking to buy a house, why not right here? Because unexpectedly, the middle of nowhere has become home to me.
if you go...
boutique winery in Delaplane, Virginia
Tasting fee: $7
tip: i first tried delaplane's wine (a viognier)
at al dente; it is currently sold out --if you can find it, it's spectacular!
