On a crisp late autumn day in 2000 my wife and I were driving on country roads west of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Located in the north-west Piedmont, with the foothills of the Appalachian mountains visible in the late afternoon sun, this is an area of rolling hills, small towns and rural settlements. The countryside displays a rich and mixed agricultural heritage, just far enough from the expanding suburban sprawl of nearby cities to avoid excessive property speculation. There are dairy farms, soya and corn fields, the occasional tobacco patch and the usual collection of decaying abandoned properties indicative of old ways of rural life that are perhaps no longer sustainable. The traffic is light, the roads narrow and the countryside evokes feelings of nostalgia for an Arcadian past, notwithstanding the occasional rusted pick-up truck and gas station/country store advertising videos and lottery tickets.

Imagine our surprise after cresting a hill when in front of us lay acres of well-tended vines on these rolling hills and several beautiful, expansive and meticulously landscaped homes. Rounding a sharp bend in the road we came across the large sign to Westbend Vineyards. Founded in 1972 by the Kroustalis family, and named after the western bend of the nearby Yadkin River, it covers 60 acres planted with prime vinifera grapes. A photograph of the area could easily mislead someone into thinking they were in Sonoma County, California.