By Pam Walatka

Before you book the train to visit a Napa Valley winery, consider that the award-winning Thomas Fogarty Winery & Vineyards is only 15 miles away from Los Altos, on Skyline Boulevard in Woodside.

In October, the winery celebrates its 25th anniversary with a special tasting and introduction of a new line of vineyard-designated wines with a redesigned label.

Fogarty will host an open house wine-tasting event noon to 4 p.m. Oct. 30 at the winery. Admission is $25 and includes tastings of wine, goat cheese, olive oil and chocolate.

A dozen single-vineyard releases will be the first wines to bear the new label.

Winemaker Michael Martella conceived the vineyard-designated program.

“Being the winemaker and viticulturist since the winery’s inception, Michael is aware that some vineyards and blocks historically produce outstanding fruit and wines,” said Anne Krolczyk, sales and marketing director.

Three of those wines - 2002 Rapley Trail Pinot Noir, 2002 Lexington Santa Cruz Mountains Meritage and 2002 Santa Cruz Mountains Camel Hill Vineyard Cabernet Franc - will debut at the Oct. 30 gala that kicks off the anniversary celebration.

Half the properties sourced for the vineyard-designated wines are estate owned. Rapley Trail Vineyard, in particular, has a most colorful past. Passing through rolling hills, deep canyons and immense redwoods, it was forged by early pioneers to link Portola Valley with the majestic mountaintop, now the site of Skyline Boulevard. Dr. Thomas Fogarty planted six acres of pinot noir in 1981 along the trail at an elevation of 1,775 feet on the parcel’s rugged southeastern slopes.

Overlooking Lexington Reservoir near Los Gatos, Camel Hill Vineyard provides fruit for the Lexington Meritage and the Camel Hill Cabernet Franc. Lexington was a thriving 1850s lumber town and stagecoach stop between San Francisco and resorts in Santa Cruz but was forsaken after the redwoods were cleared and a railroad replaced coach travel. It remained sparsely populated until the reservoir was built in 1952.

The 2002 Lexington Santa Cruz Mountains Meritage is a blend of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc and merlot. Beginning with the 2003 vintage, however, the wine will be named Camel Hill Santa Cruz Mountains Lexington Meritage to reflect its single fruit source.

The Camel Hill component of the name stems from the grower’s interest in exotic animals. Vineyard owner John Anderson keeps Dromedary camels, Norwegian Fjord horses, Dutch Friesian horses and emu on the property.

For more information, visit

fogartywinery.com or call 851-6777.