Winery hotels & vineyard stays in Virginia

Virginia has been trying to make wine since Thomas Jefferson planted vines at Monticello in the 1770s, and only in the last three decades has it worked. The Blue Ridge foothills around Charlottesville now hold the country's most convincing Viognier and Cabernet Franc, and the estates that grow them — many in restored 18th and 19th century farmhouses — take guests.

Jefferson's own vineyard never produced a commercial vintage; the phylloxera and humidity that defeated him defeated everyone else until the 1970s, when Gianni Zonin planted vinifera at Barboursville and proved it could be done. Virginia now has ten AVAs and around 300 wineries, with the densest and most serious cluster in the Monticello AVA around Charlottesville. Viognier is the signature white — the state adopted it unofficially — and Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Petit Manseng handle the humid summers better than Cabernet Sauvignon ever has. The appeal beyond the wine is the setting: Skyline Drive and Shenandoah National Park run along the western edge, Monticello and Montpelier are minutes from several estates, and the region is a two-hour drive from Washington, DC. Stays are small — farmhouse inns, estate cottages, B&Bs with a handful of rooms — and book out for autumn foliage. Harvest runs September into October.