One of Paso Robles’ most esteemed wineries is hitting new heights with a pop-up tasting room at a ski resort.
On Saturday, Daou Vineyards and Winery celebrates the grand opening of Daou Lounge at Mammoth Mountain Ski Area near Mammoth Lakes in the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains.
“Our passion for adventure, innovation and authenticity now leads us to Mammoth Mountain, a land inspired by the same character and vision,” the winery wrote in a Feb. 1 Facebook post. “Experience the magic of Daou where you most feel alive, here amid the vistas and thrills of Mammoth Mountain.”
Located inside McCoy Station, the resort’s mid-mountain food court, Daou Lounge will offer “complimentary tastings of luxury wines as well as full glass pours and delicious Mediterranean appetizers for purchase,” according to the Mammoth Mountain website. “Ski-in or hop on the Panorama Gondola across from Main Lodge and then sit back and relax in the lounge amid picturesque views.”
Customers must be 21 and older to taste or purchase wine at the lounge, the resort said.
Daou senior director Christina Rivera-Glenn was at lounge site on Friday.
The air is “very chilly, but it’s so beautiful up here” at 9,600 feet above sea level, she said. “The sky is so blue!”
In addition to Daou Vineyards & Winery, located on a hilltop estate in the Adelaida region of Paso Robles, the expanding commercial empire of brothers Georges and Daniel Daou includes a future Daou Ocean project in Cambria and the renovation of the nearly century-old Bank of Italy building in downtown Paso Robles.
The Daous “love the mountains. They were raised in the mountains of Lebanon,” Maeve Pesquera, Daou senior vice president, said Friday. “They wanted to share the Daou experience out in the world, take the wines to the people where they are, share the Daou story and experience in an unexpected place.”
She added that the brothers “feel luxury wine should be accessible to everyone.”
Daou Lounge will operate as a five-week pop-up at Mammoth Mountain, Pesquera said, adding that whether it will return next season hasn’t been decided yet.
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Kathe Tanner has been writing about the people and places of SLO County’s North Coast since 1981, first as a columnist and then also as a reporter. Her career has included stints as a bakery owner, public relations director, radio host, trail guide and jewelry designer. She has been a resident of Cambria for more than four decades, and if it’s happening in town, Kathe knows about it.
Dining and Cooking