Stunning photos by Eric Bentley
By Jackie Hollenkamp Bentley
It looks like we have started a new family tradition: the Kentucky Derby Festival’s WineFest. How can you not? You have more than 65 wineries from Kentucky and Indiana offering tastes of their best vino, roaming cheese and fruit trays, food pairing demonstrations—all on the Belvedere.
It’s the event my nephew lives for every year and now he has us looking forward to it. Heck, even his sister and her family flew up from Florida to partake of the festivities.
They went all fancy and bought the $85 VIP tickets so they were able to enjoy some amenities not available to us lowly $45 general tickets. (In all honesty, they HAD to buy the VIP tickets since it sold out last week.)
Last year, the WineFest fell on my mom’s (in the blue hoodie) birthday. Even though her 80th, yes 80th, birthday was last week, we continued to celebrate. She’s proof that 80 is the new 40. She can hang with the best of them!
If there’s any proof that we now take the WineFest seriously, my glowing niece—who is nine months pregnant—wasn’t going to miss it, either. She adapted, as evidenced by the tasty bowl of Comfy Cow Ice Cream. In addition to Comfy Cow, festival goers could also purchase popcorn, beer, as well as various products from vendors scattered throughout the Belvedere.
Her “condition” also provided some of us the much needed “DD”. Uber and my husband, Eric, provided the rest of the “DD” duties (and I’m very grateful for it). Ignore the photo bomber. It’s my brother and after hearing what fun we had last year, he decided to join us this year.
And we weren’t the only ones having fun. Smiles and laughter were plentiful, especially a few hours into it.
Of the various wineries set up, we seemed to hit these guys from Horseshoe Bend the most. I highly recommend the cabernet sauvignon.
So, another Winefest under our belts. Can’t wait to see who joins us next year!
