Stories & guides
Guide · Keuka Lake
Where to start, how to plan your route, and what makes the Keuka Lake wine trail its own quiet corner of the Finger Lakes.
Guide · Finger Lakes
Eleven lakes, hundreds of wineries, and one honest question: where do you actually begin? Here is how we'd choose.
Around the lake
Penn Yan holds the north-east tip of Keuka Lake. It is a working village first and a destination second, which is exactly what makes it worth the drive.
Most visitors drive the east side of Keuka and go home. The western arm ends at Branchport, and it is the quieter half by some distance.
Outdoors
Water leaves Keuka at Penn Yan and drops toward Seneca. For a century that fall of water ran mills. The towpath beside it is now a walking trail.
Every other Finger Lake is a long finger. Keuka has two arms, and the land between them is a ridge that rises straight out of the water.
The lake
The lake is the reason any of this exists. Understanding its shape and depth explains the vineyards, the villages, and why the drive takes longer than you think.
Glaciers left steep valleys and every side stream had to find its way down. That is why this region has more waterfalls than almost anywhere in the north-east.
The walking here divides into two kinds: down into a gorge, or along a ridge above the water. They ask for different days and different shoes.
Planning your visit
Camping here is cheap, close to the water, and colder at night than most visitors expect, even in July.
Hammondsport gets the visitors. Bath, twenty minutes inland, is where the county actually runs from.
Wine came first here by a century and a half. Everything else arrived recently, and the region is better for it.
Where you sleep here decides how much driving you do. That is the whole calculation, and it is worth doing before you book.
The lakes hold heat into November and hold spring back until May. Everything about visiting here follows from that.
The tour buses stop in November. What is left is snow on the vineyard rows and a tasting room where you can hear yourself think.
Children are not the problem people expect them to be here. The lake, the parks and the museums do most of the work.
Twenty minutes separates them and they give you completely different days. Picking the wrong one for your trip is the most common planning mistake here.
There is no way around the car. Once you accept that, the rest of the planning gets much simpler.
The best road here is rarely the fastest one. Around a lake shaped like a Y, that is more true than usual.
The region
The vines are here because of the water, and they have been on these particular slopes longer than almost anywhere else in the country.
There is no best lake. There is a best lake for the trip you are actually taking, and they are genuinely different from one another.
The mistake couples make here is booking too much. The lake rewards doing less, slowly, in one place.
Most of the shoreline is private. Knowing where the public access is changes what a day on this lake can be.
A group of ten is a different proposition from a couple. The lake handles it well, as long as somebody has made the calls in advance.
The orchards predate the vineyards. Cider is the older drink here by a long way, and it is having a second life.
West of Keuka the land rises into a steep valley, and Naples sits at the bottom of it. Grape country, one lake over.
Watkins Glen takes all the attention at the foot of Seneca. Montour Falls is two miles further on, and considerably quieter.
Watkins Glen sits at the foot of Seneca Lake. Keuka is the next lake west, twenty minutes over the hill. The two make very different afternoons.
Dogs are welcome throughout our winery, inside as well as out. Here is what a day around Keuka Lake looks like when you bring yours.
The park sits on the bluff between the two arms of the lake. Here is how we would build a day around it, morning on the water and afternoon above it.
Guide · Hammondsport
Aviation history at the south end of Keuka Lake, five minutes from the village square, and how it fits into an afternoon here.
Nineteen waterfalls in a single mile, a racetrack that shaped American motorsport, and a village at the foot of Seneca Lake. Here is how to fit it into a day.
Twenty minutes south of the vineyards sits a glass museum with a global reputation and a walkable old downtown. The best bad-weather day in the region.
A trail shaped like a Y, which changes how you drive it. What the route is, how many stops to plan, and the mistake most first-timers make.
Guide · Tasting
What happens when you sit down, what it costs, and the questions people are too polite to ask. Written by the people doing the pouring.
Itinéraire · Finger Lakes
Two days, one lake, and enough room to sit down. An itinerary written by people who live at the middle of it.
Saison · Finger Lakes
Six weeks when the whole region works late. What is happening in the cellar while you are on the terrace, and why it is the best time to come.
The village square, the lake, an aviation museum, and a slow afternoon of wine — how we'd spend a day in Hammondsport.
How we'd plan the food side of a day on Keuka Lake — from a lakeside lunch to the village square, food trucks at our events, and pairings on the terrace.
Craft · Sparkling
Champagne is a place in France. Sparkling wine is a whole world. A family with six generations in Champagne explains where the line really falls.
The bubbles come from a second fermentation inside the bottle. Here's the whole method — bottle by bottle, turn by turn — from a family that has worked it for six generations.
Wine 101 · Riesling
Where the grape comes from, why it thrives in a cool climate like Keuka Lake, and how we work it on our slope above the water.
Riesling runs from bone-dry to sweet — and where a bottle lands is a decision we make in the cellar. Here's how it works, and how to read the label.
Wine 101 · Serving
How many days an open bottle really keeps, by type, and the simple habits that stretch it — reclose, chill, and keep the air out.
The eleven lakes, the wine trails, the waterfalls and State Parks — and how a quiet day on Keuka Lake fits into all of it.
Visit · Finger Lakes
Spring, summer, fall, or winter — a season-by-season look at Keuka Lake from the people who work the vines, and when we'd tell you to come.
The color coming in along the hills, and the harvest happening underneath it — fall around Keuka Lake, told from inside the vineyard and the cellar.
