REGION
Tuesday, September 14, 2021
East Oregonian
A3
M-F winery Ducleaux Cellars cancels in-person tastings
By EMRY DINMAN
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Passion and a hopeful
beginning
M I LT ON - F R E E WA-
TER — When Toby Turlay
and Chris Dukelow decided
to open a winery and tasting
room in Milton-Freewater
three years ago, they may have
assumed the most diffi cult part
would be making wine worth
buying.
Navigating a global
pandemic that has gripped the
country and their home for the
last 19 months was not part of
the business plan.
This year, with the COVID-
19 delta variant surging and
hospital systems strained
across the country, Turlay
and Dukelow made a painful
decision: Ducleaux Cellars is
canceling in-person tastings.
Though the couple are fully
vaccinated and are not likely
to be hospitalized, the risk
that a breakthrough case could
impact their sense of taste and
smell, a common side eff ect of
COVID-19, is too great, they
said.
“We have a family member
who got COVID a year ago;
she still doesn’t have her sense
of smell back,” Dukelow said
in an interview. “The worst
thing that could happen to us
right now during harvest is to
lose our taste and smell.”
It all started with a really
bad cabernet.
Dukelow grew up in
Richland, Washington, and
as an adult he would often go
wine tasting with his parents,
where he developed a love for
the art of fermenting grapes.
Dukelow and Turlay drank
a lot of wine, the pair said,
and decided to try making a
home brew for the fun of it.
The fi rst batch was terrible.
But the experience was
intoxicating enough for the
duo. Dukelow went to a night
school in Seattle to study
grape-growing and wine-
making, known by those in
the industry as viticulture and
enology.
In 2013, they produced
their fi rst commercial batch,
and though the business still
was largely a hobby, they
weren’t producing bad cab
anymore.
“You’re investing money in
grapes, and so you better not
screw it up,” Dukelow said.
After their kids moved
away for college, the pair
considered moving to wine
country and found a beau-
tiful piece of property in
Milton-Freewater three years
ago. They named it Ducleaux,
a French-sounding play on
Dukelow’s family name.
The fi rst year, 2019, was
dedicated to setting up the
business. The next, 2020, was
supposed to be about opening
Ducleaux’s doors.
Turlay, wanting to be able
to help more with the busi-
ness, studied with the Walla
Walla Community College’s
Institute of Enology and Viti-
culture, fi nishing that program
in June 2020. By then the
pandemic had hit, but the class
had moved from hands-on
work to studying models and
memorizing charts, and her
education was relatively unaf-
fected.
But the business was hit
hard from the start.
Starts and stops
“The fi rst year was about
getting things ready to open
up, then, about when we were
ready, the pandemic hit,”
Turlay said. “It’s been starts
and stops.”
Umatilla County, where
their business is, often has
had relatively high COVID-
19 transmission rates for the
state and region. But for a brief
moment in 2021, it seemed
like things were beginning
to return to some sense of
normalcy.
This year is a big one
for Ducleaux Cellars. They
source their grapes from the
Walla Walla and Columbia
Greg Lehman/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Toby Turlay and Chris Dukelow pause during a syrah crush
session Sept. 3, 2021, at Ducleaux Cellars, Milton-Freewater.
valleys, but the plan always
had been to turn Ducle-
aux into primarily an estate
winery, making wine from
grapes they grow rather than
relying on another vineyard’s
product. Now in their third
year, vines planted in 2019
are being harvested for the
fi rst time.
The business owners had
planned to have year-round
tastings, and as vaccinations
rose and case counts dropped
this spring, Ducleaux opened
its doors again for Friday and
Saturday tastings.
“Our tasting room is in the
winery, and we always had the
big bay doors open,” Turlay
said. “But that was before the
delta variant took off .”
As hospitalizations began
to skyrocket again, parallel-
ing or surpassing the worst
moments in the pandemic
before that point, the couple
decided to reverse course.
Vaccination rates lagged
behind the rest of Oregon
and the U.S., and Turlay and
Dukelow didn’t want to be in a
position where they had to ask
customers for proof of vacci-
nation.
So they canceled tastings
altogether. It was not a deci-
sion they made lightly.
“It certainly impacts the
business plan and reduces
revenue and our ability to sell
wine,” Dukelow said.
But the risk, both to them-
selves and to their community,
was too great, they decided.
The senses of smell and taste
are fundamental to a wine-
maker, helping them ensure
fermentation is working the
way it should and that the
fi nal product will be worth a
premium.
“If you can’t smell that
something’s going wrong,
then you can’t fi x it,” Dukelow
said. “You could ruin your
whole lot of wine.”
Turlay added: “I didn’t
feel that sense of safety that
we thought we had. I also
didn’t want to be the source
of spreading COVID, either.
I would feel horrible.”
To try to recoup some of
their lost revenue, the couple
has tried to lean on virtual
tasting events, an option
that has proven popular
with some businesses lead-
ing team building meetings
and the like. And, Dukelow
noted, they produce a
commodity uniquely suited
to sitting and waiting for a
better day.
“We are fortunate in that
most wine made well does
better with aging,” Dukelow
said. “So it just means we’ll
have more inventory we’ll
need to sell when the pandem-
ic’s over.”
EO, Herald win two dozen awards in statewide journalism contest
SALEM — The East Oregonian
and Hermiston Herald took home
24 Oregon Newspaper Publishers
Association awards at a virtual cere-
mony on Friday, Sept. 10.
Judged by members of the
Arizona Newspapers Associa-
tion and considered against other
Oregon newspapers of similar size,
the EO and Herald collectively took
home fi ve fi rst place prizes in the
Better Newspaper Contest. Along
with the rest of the fi eld, the East
Oregonian and Hermiston Herald
were judged for their work in 2020,
which included the historic Umatilla
River fl oods and the beginning of
the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I think that the number of
awards is a testament to the work
that the East Oregonian and Herm-
iston Herald did in 2020,” said
Andrew Cutler, the publisher of the
EO and Herald.
The East Oregonian ended its run
of general excellence awards, taking
third place behind The News-Re-
view in Roseburg and the Grants
Pass Daily Courier. Prior to 2021,
the EO won fi rst place in general
excellence nine out of the past 10
years.
Cutler said not continuing the
East Oregonian’s streak was disap-
pointing but did act as a motivator to
recapture the title next year.
Jade McDowell, the former
editor of the Herald, had a banner
2020, her last full year with the
company before departing. She
won fi rst place prizes in the edito-
rial column, personality feature and
business or economic issue catego-
ries, the latter also producing a third
place award for McDowell. McDow-
ell and community reporter Tammy
Malgesini placed two and three in
the best local column category,
while McDowell also won a third
place award for enterprise reporting
for her work in the East Oregonian.
It also was another strong year
Parade marks 9/11
for reporter Kathy Aney, who took
home fi rst place in the personal-
ity feature category, second place
in best local column and two third
place prizes for educational cover-
age and lifestyle coverage. She
shared a third place award for best
spot news coverage with reporter
Antonio Sierra.
Individually, Sierra won two
awards: second place in coverage
of a business or economic issue
and third place for general feature
story. Photographer Ben Loner-
gan was one of the EO’s other fi rst
place winners, garnering the top
prize for best news photo. He also
earned second place in feature
8
photo, second place in sports photo
and third place in the photo essay
category.
The EO wasn’t recognized only
for its reporting. Cutler won third
place for best headline writing,
and page designer Andy Nico-
lais got a third place award for
best page design. Overall, it was a
good award year for the EO Media
Group, the company that owns the
East Oregonian and Hermiston
Herald. In addition to the dozens
of awards won by EOMG papers,
The Bulletin in Bend and The
Daily Astorian won fi rst place in
the general excellence category in
their respective groups.
8AM TO 4PM
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Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
East Umatilla Fire & Rescue Assistant Chief Jeremy Lasater, left, and Andrew Fournell, a
fi refi ghter and paramedic with East Umatilla Fire & Rescue, stand below an American fl ag
Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021, in downtown Athena following a 9/11 memorial parade through
the county. The parade, which began in Helix, wrapped through Adams and Weston before
fi nishing in downtown Athena.
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