Over the remaining five days of our jam-packed visit to the Okanagan we were able to get to almost everything on our list of to-dos except one. And it wasn't wine tasting!
With the Spring Wine Festival in full swing, obviously wine tasting and fine food were top priorities. Although, as my regular readers might point out with some justification, when has "Sipping and Supping" not been a top priority in my life?
But as well I was eager to find out about the cultural and dance scene in and around Kelowna - and then, as we planned to be utterly exhausted from our intense labours, what better excuse could we have for relaxing and being pampered at a Spa?
Alas, although our research indicated a number of local spas that looked enticing, pampering was the one activity for which we just could not find time. So no Spas for us. Oh, the tough life of travelblogue writers!
In spring, summer, fall and winter in British Columbia's stunningly beautiful Okanagan Valley, the Okanagan Wine Festivals Society organizes a Festival to celebrate wine, food, culture and a wide range of summer and winter outdoor activities.
I was in Kelowna for the May 2010 Spring Wine Festival and met with Christina Ferreira and Blair Baldwin of the Society to learn about the origin and current festivities of these Wine Festivals.
This year is the 30th anniversary of the first Fall Festival which was an informal gathering of local 5 wineries to party and celebrate the end of harvest. The Spring Festival was started much later but over the 16 years of tracking attendance at these two festivals, it seems that their popularity is now on a par.
Thirty years later, the Spring and Fall Festivals have grown into 10 day events that see approximately 200,000 visits to participating wineries. About 1000 people attend the smaller weekend long Winter and Summer Festivals held at the resorts
To set the stage- or perhaps I should say - to set the table - for the "supping" aspect of our Destination Travel: Kelowna I arranged to meet Chef Rod Butters at his restaurant, RauDZ, on Water Street, on the first morning of our visit. An icy wind was blowing through the streets of downtown Kelowna and by the time we arrived at the door of the restaurant we were chilled. Chef Butters invited us in and promptly offered to brew Americanos. We stood at the bar and sipped the coffee and I gradually felt the warmth seeping back into my body.
I was familiar with his culinary biography but curious about a few of his culinary adventures so we began our discussion there. A B.C. native, Chef Butters was born in Port Coquitlam and worked at The Keg during high school. He went to Indiana State on a baseball scholarship and then played in Washington State. He returned to Vancouver to attend culinary school, and then worked at Scaramouche in Toronto, Four Seasons Hotels in Toronto and Vancouver, the opening team at Chateau Whistler among other places.
In 1996 he embarked on an exciting venture as the opening chef and co-manager with Charles McDiarmid, managing owner, for the new Wickaninnish Inn in Tofino on the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Opening that quality of world class hotel and restaurant in the middle of nowhere with the challenges of getting staffing and supplies to the West Coast of the Island, was one of the stand-out experiences of his life. Chef Butters commented that this remarkable achievement was a testament to everyone that worked to make this happen from dishwashers, housekeeping and office staff to management.
I understood what he was saying because the Wickaninnish Inn holds a special place in my heart. In October 1999 my brother and sister-in-law came out from South Africa to visit with my husband, who was quite ill at the time. We wanted to show them something special about British Columbia and we picked Wicknninnish Inn as that special choice. The flight we booked stopped in Victoria and then the small plane flew north for a while along the mountainous spine of the Vancouver Island Range. The image of breaking through the clouds into a V of sunlight just before landing at Tofino,is engraved in my memory.
At the Inn we had a beautiful room looking out onto an inlet with huge waves breaking on the rocks. The second memory I hold from that time is soaking in the hot tub in our room and observing the sight and sound of the crashing waves and foam spraying from the rocks.The third memory is of savoring the flavours of the wonderful meals we enjoyed over the days that we were there. Our visit to Wickaninnish Inn was all too short, but it is one of the treasured times that comfort me whenever sad thoughts come to mind.
For the first day of our Kelowna visit I had three pre-arranged meetings and from what came out of those, I planned to let the rest of the day's activities develop spontaneously. First order of the day was to stop in at the Tourism Kelowna Visitor's Centre to pick up an information package that Catherine had left for me.
The drive into Kelowna along Westside Road is both spectacularly beautiful and hair-raising. Round every curve in the road - and there are many curves - you see vista after vista of stunning mountains and lake. Sometimes the road drops down so steeply that it feels as though you are driving into an infinity pool. The hair-raising bit comes from the occasional driver on the road who screams up behind at a speed way over the speed limit and then drives so close on your tail that a sudden need to brake for a deer or anything else would inevitably mean a collision. And we have seen lots of deer munching away on the side of the road.
With the Vancouver Marathon closing the streets in our neighbourhood, we needed to make sure we set off on our journey before they barricaded the side streets and prevented us from getting out of the area. Amazingly, since I had had less than three hours sleep, it was actually our planned time of 6:45 am when my little Audi emerged from our underground parking and turned onto Beach Avenue.
As we turned onto Richards I realized that the right side of the road was already barricaded. The left lane was open but the light was red. The problem was that the light responds to pressure pads on the right side of the road so my car could wait in the other lane for hours and the light would not change to green for me.
Well actually getting from Vancouver to Kelowna for normal people is not complicated. If you want to get there fast it is about a 40 minute flight from Vancouver to Kelowna Airport and there are direct flights also from Victoria, Calgary, Edmonton and Toronto. Driving from Vancouver should take around four hours and from Seattle, Spokane or Calgary- about 6 hours.
However, when it comes to driving I am not a "normal person." Firstly while I don't drive especially slowly I can say that the first and only speeding ticket I have ever received was over thirty years ago. And it was not really my fault! I was cruising over the Second Narrows Bridge and got distracted by my kids arguing in the back seat so my foot may have been a little heavier than usual on the accelerator and I did not spy the cops lurking behind the concrete pillar on the Mountain Highway exit.
Secondly, as a downtown gal, I walk rather than drive and in 10 years, I have accumulated the grand total of 50,000 kms on my little Audi. So while several of my neighbours drive back and forth between Vancouver and Kelowna like I drive from Yaletown to Kerrisdale, planning to drive to Kelowna for me became a logistical exercise akin to planning an expedition to the North Pole.
In October 2008, with my group of food and wine-loving travel pals, I spent a few days dining and wining in the Naramata area - A Taste of the South Okanagan. A month ago, on the spur of the moment I decided to book a week's vacation at the Lake Okanagan Resort in Kelowna. Although I realized that the area had changed greatly, memories of a magical week spent at the Resort more than 15 years ago had stayed with me all this time. As it turned out the week I was going to be in Kelowna was when the 16th Annual Okanagan Spring festival was on, so my plans for a sedate, book-filled vacation suddenly got more adventurous.
Over the remaining five days of our jam-packed visit to the Okanagan we were able to get to almost everything on our list of to-dos except one. And it wasn't wine tasting!
With the Spring Wine Festival in full swing, obviously wine tasting and fine food were top priorities. Although, as my regular readers might point out with some justification, when has "Sipping and Supping" not been a top priority in my life?
In spring, summer, fall and winter in British Columbia's stunningly beautiful Okanagan Valley, the Okanagan Wine Festivals Society organizes a Festival to celebrate wine, food, culture and a wide range of summer and winter outdoor activities.
To set the stage- or perhaps I should say - to set the table - for the "supping" aspect of our Destination Travel: Kelowna I arranged to meet Chef Rod Butters at his restaurant, 
For the first day of our Kelowna visit I had three pre-arranged meetings and from what came out of those, I planned to let the rest of the day's activities develop spontaneously. First order of the day was to stop in at the Tourism Kelowna Visitor's Centre to pick up an information package that Catherine had left for me.
With the Vancouver Marathon closing the streets in our neighbourhood, we needed to make sure we set off on our journey before they barricaded the side streets and prevented us from getting out of the area. Amazingly, since I had had less than three hours sleep, it was actually our planned time of 6:45 am when my little Audi emerged from our underground parking and turned onto Beach Avenue. 
Getting there. It's Complicated!
In October 2008, with my group of food and wine-loving travel pals, I spent a few days dining and wining in the Naramata area - 
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