Spring Creek Wine Cellar – Appomattox Gourmet Treat
Spring Creek Wine Cellar is located on Cannongate Angus Farm just outside Pamplin. Gene and Evelyn McCluney raise black Angus cows here and make wine from their own grapes. They have been planting their vineyards for approximately eight years now and produce about 200 cases of wine annually.
Gene and Evelyn moved to Virginia from Texas about 25 years ago, and finally decided to make their own wine after traveling around to visit other wineries in Virginia. The McCluneys wanted more from their wine, more bouquet, more flavor and decided that the best way to get what they were looking for was to make it themselves.
Before beginning to plant, they researched the types of wine grapes that will grow happily in central Virginia. From these varieties, they narrowed it down to ones they particularly liked. This experimenting resulted in a vineyard planted in predominantly white grapes with two reds. About half the varieties are French hybrids and the rest are vinifera grapes, Old World varieties.
The McCluneys do all the work themselves from picking to sorting, to crushing, fermenting, racking, bottling, corking and finally affixing the labels. They have turned the lower level of their home into a wine cellar and tasting room. The grapes are picked in the early morning so that they are finished by 8 am.
After picking the grapes are sorted and carefully picked over to remove bad grapes, twigs, leaves, and other debris before they are washed and fed into the de-stemming machine. The clean, stemmed grapes are then crushed to remove the juice and the must (grape pulp) is fed to the cattle.
Gene prepares the stainless steel fermentation vessels and pitches the yeast to get the wine started. Then it is a waiting game until the grape juice becomes wine. The finished wine is allowed to age in the fermentation vessels after it is racked off the lees (siphoned from the yeast solids that settle to the bottom) until it is ready to be bottled and put on the shelf for sale.
Spring Creek Wine is sold at the winery by the case or bottle. The tasting room is open on weekends from 1 until 6 PM and at other times by appointment. Visitors are welcome to bring lunch and enjoy the rural atmosphere while they sample some of the excellent wines produced by the McCluneys.
Very much a labor of love, Spring Creek Wine Cellar is in a beautifully peaceful location and offers quite excellent wines. You owe it to yourself to pay a visit.
You can taste the “Labor of Love” that is put into each and every bottle of wine that is produced at Spring Creek Wine Cellar. A bonus on your wine tour, don’t miss it.
Absolutely delicious! You can taste the “love” they put into their winemaking with every sip.
We think our customers would really enjoy visiting your winery, and it’s good for us to have interesting nearby destinations to which to send them. Do you have a website? If so, may we link to you for our site’s visitors, and would you link to us for your visitors? We’re about 10 miles from the now-closed Stonewall Vineyard. We needed an alternative, so are glad to hear about you.
Your work must be nonstop! Congratulations on 8 years.