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Offered languages
- English
Drive Seneca Lake yourself, with a GPS audio guide that plays automatically as you go. Your booking unlocks the whole lake in the free Wine Trails app: pick your date and starting point, Watkins Glen or Geneva, choose the wineries you want from the 42 mapped along Route 14 and Route 414, and the app builds your personal route with turn-by-turn narration. Narrated stories cover the people behind the tasting rooms: Konstantin Frank and Hermann Wiemer, who proved European vines could survive these winters, the four growers who opened Glenora in 1977, the Fulkersons on land their family has farmed since 1805, the castle at Belhurst, the salt beneath the lake and the Seneca Drums. No group, no schedule, no guide; stop for lunch in Hector or a walk through the Watkins Glen gorge, replay anything, and the audio keeps working when the signal drops between the vineyards, because everything downloads offline. You'll need a car and a designated driver; tastings are paid at each winery.
What's Included
Meeting and pickup
Itinerary
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1Watkins Glen State Park
Nineteen waterfalls in two miles at the foot of the lake: Glen Creek drops four hundred feet through a shale gorge, and the trail passes behind the curtains of falling water.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
2
Hilltop estate above Watkins Glen since 1983, two hundred acres with forty under vine and a terrace that looks the full length of the lake toward Geneva.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
3Lakewood Vineyards
The Stamp family bought a run-down orchard here in 1951 and first pressed their own grapes in 1988; three generations, a hundred acres of vines and more than 1,600 medals since.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
4Glenora Wine Cellars
The first winery on Seneca Lake, founded in 1977 by four growers the year after the Farm Winery Act; five thousand cases in its first vintage, now with an inn and the Veraisons restaurant.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
5Fulkerson Winery
Caleb Fulkerson claimed this land in 1805 and planted his willow walking stick in a spring; the seventh generation opened the winery in 1989 and makes more than thirty wines.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
6
Mosel-born Hermann Wiemer planted vinifera on an abandoned soybean farm above Dundee in 1976; ninety acres today, a biodynamic home vineyard and the benchmark Finger Lakes Riesling.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
7Fox Run Vineyards
Fifty acres of east-facing vines planted in 1984 by John Kaiser, who still manages them; winery since 1990, certified sustainable, with a cafe run by chef Brud Holland.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
8Anthony Road Wine Company
John and Ann Martini planted their first five acres here in 1973; four Martini siblings now run thirty acres of estate vines near Penn Yan, known for aromatic whites.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
9
Morten Hallgren, raised on a Provence estate and trained in Montpellier, founded Ravines in 2001; bone-dry Riesling and Loire-style Cabernet Franc from limestone and shale.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
10Belhurst Castle Winery
A four-storey castle begun in 1888 by Carrie Harron Collins, a speakeasy and casino from 1933, and since 1992 an estate winery, inn and restaurant on the Geneva shore.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
11
Four tasting rooms on one property since 2007, from bone-dry Stony Lonesome to sweet Bagg Dare plus War Horse Brewing; the most visited craft beverage stop in the Finger Lakes.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
12
Riesling and Cabernet Franc only, on the steep eastern slope above Lodi; founded by publisher Bruce Murray and botanist Diana Lyttle and ranked among America's top 101 wineries.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
13
Mark Wagner's Greek Revival winery opened in 1992 on land four generations of Wagners have farmed; 132 estate acres and every wine made in-house.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
14
Open since 1979, one of the first estate wineries of the modern Finger Lakes, with thirty-plus wines, the Wagner Valley brewery and the Ginny Lee Cafe above the eastern shore.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
15Hazlitt 1852 Vineyards
The Hazlitts have grown grapes here since 1852; the winery opened in 1985 and Red Cat became one of New York's best-selling wines, now run by the sixth generation.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free -
16
Founded in 1998 by cellar master David Whiting and Cornell microbiologist Debra Whiting, with the Red Newt Bistro alongside since 1999; Riesling, Gewurztraminer and Cabernet Franc in Hector.
30 minutes • Admission ticket free
Additional info
- Infants and small children can ride in a pram or stroller
- Service animals allowed
- Suitable for all physical fitness levels
Tags
Cancellation Policy
For a full refund, cancel at least 24 hours before the scheduled departure time.
Cancellation Policy
- For a full refund, you must cancel at least 24 hours before the experience’s start time.
- If you cancel less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time, the amount you paid will not be refunded.
- Any changes made less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time will not be accepted.
You can cancel up to 24 hours in advance of the experience for a full refund.
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