Wines

with an altitude

Vineyard Geography and Soils

‘Once there were mines, now its fine wines’

Once a bustling Gold Rush town of which little remains, Fair Play today is home to a beautiful rural wine country boasting 25 award winning wineries, four B&Bs, unique eateries and family farms all surrounded by the oak and pine forests of the upper Sierra Foothills. Not a traffic-light to be found, just friendly hardworking people who have open their hearts and doors to visitors from around the world.

Fair Play was lost in time before vineyards began dotting the rolling landscape and wineries began opening their tasting room doors. Nestled between the middle and south forks of the Cosumnes River located formally within El Dorado County’s borders but isolated in many ways and sharing more kinship with its immediate downhill neighbors in Amador County’s Shenandoah Valley. This isolation and equi-distance from a town  and its public utilities in any direction left Fair Play on its with little  resources to grow – big subdivisions that is, business parks and shopping centers alike. When finally after years of standing off attempts to over-develop, a 20 acre minimum was voted in recognizing the agricultural uniqueness of our soils and pristine environment. Quite possibly the most useful expression of my Soil & Water Science degree from UCDavis was pointing out the lack of water to service development and the greatness of our soils as the expert in rooms charged with developers and local opponents pleading before El Dorado County officials. So the future is bright and prosperous for Fair Play and a welcoming island of refuge for urbanites from all over.  Located 15 miles southeast of Placerville and 15 miles east of Plymouth.

Fair Play boasts abnormally deep, well developed coarse sandy loam soils developed in place through the weathering over thousands of years of the underlying monolith of granite that makes up much of the upper reaches of the Sierra Foothills. The lack of pumpable groundwater is mitigated by the high annual rainfall averaging 40 inches and the deep absorbent soil profile. In a good year of average rainfall coupled with the water held in soil storage near 70% of a vineyard’s water needs can be met naturally with the rest supplemented through drip irrigation. Some grape varieties can actually muster up enough water from earth and rain to survive and thrive without even drip irrigation but only where the soil is deep. Wine grapes are the perfect thrifty partner to these natural conditions. Thus the explosion of wineries starting with Fitzpatrick in 1980 to near 25 today.