Willcox Chuck Wagon Cookoff

What do you do on a Sat. that there is nothing else planned? Well of course you head out to a Chuck Wagon Cookoff - so off to Willcox (about 70 miles east of Tucson) anticipating a history lesson. There were about 6 Chuck Wagons set up and they were just starting their cooking when we arrived around 11am. It took us a total of 15 minutes to walk around and gain our history lesson for the day. Not a real exciting event.

 So what do you do when you drive that far and are disappointed in the event you went to? Well of course you head out to visit wineries and taste wine. The first winery we stopped at was Passion Winery and it wasn't that good, so on to some wineries that we had not visited the last time we were in Willcox, which is quite a ways out of town. We enjoyed our time at Bodega Pierce Winery, the hostess (owner) was just wonderful and gave us tastes of new wines that are not quite available to the public yet. We ended up with purchasing 4 bottles.

Then on to Pillsbury Winery, where we left with 3 bottles. Let me also explain that to get to all these wineries you need to drive on dirt roads. The Lincoln is absolutely filthy, and of course on the way home it sprinkled off and on to make it worse.

 After Pillsbury, we went to Zapara Vineyards where we were greeted by some beautiful poppies. We left there with 4 bottles.

Our last stop was Golden Rule Winery, where the owner came out to greet us as we were walking into the tasting room. Most of these wineries are so friendly that makes them so pleasant to visit.  After tasting 10 wines there, we were ready to head home, walking out with 6 bottles. We were pleasantly surprised on the quality of the wines that we tasted. AZ wines have sure improved.

Even though we didn't get to experience Chuck Wagon food, we sure enjoyed the Willcox wines.