Osoyoos is so much different in the winter.
It’s eerily quieter even on a Sunday.
The first time we stayed in this town was summer and it was so much alive with people on summer holiday.
This time around there was hardly anyone by the beach, which was teeming with people when we first came here about four years ago.
There was hardly a vehicle on the streets, which was the opposite from that summer.
Even the orchards and vineyards signalled that the town takes a break from business.
There were some fruits that remained on lifeless trees and vines.
We went to a number of wineries.
There were hardly people in them, aside from a family in one that we came to check out.
A number of wineries we had hoped to see were even close.
If you’re not in a rush or not the driver, this means that you can sample all the wines that you wanted.
But since we only had several hours before our flight in Kelowna, we weren’t really drinking seriously.
My partner was only sipping wines, as opposed to seriously drinking.
He was the one driving, so I ended up drinking most of what the wines he sampled.
From time to time he’d ask me whether I liked the wine.
I really couldn’t tell the difference from one to another, except when it’s a dessert or ice wine.
Our last winery stop was in Summerland at the Sumac Ridge winery.
It was getting dark, although it was barely 4 p.m.
Most of the wineries were closing at 4 p.m. and although others remained open until 5 p.m. it would have been difficult to find them because the sun has set and we didn’t have a good map.
When we made it to Kelowna, it was dark and the temperature has gone down significantly.
For some reason I was craving bad Chinese food.
I gave in.
We went to a Chinese buffet and had a feast of a standard, flavourless and uninspired food.
By the time we finished dinner, it was time to head to the airport to catch our flight back to Cowtown.
I’d like to come back to Osoyoos and the Okanagan, but it has to be in the summer or at least in the fall.
Dec. 5, 2010
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