STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK
John Bailey had enjoyed six wine pairings the evening before as part of a Wine Auction vintner dinner at a private home that included a smattering of lobster, scallops, lamb and filet mignon.
But he didn’t let that stop him from taking part in the Sun Valley Museum of Art’s newest addition to its Sun Valley Wine Auction Week: Cycle & Sip.
“The sun’s out and I don’t need an excuse to go biking and I don’t need an excuse to sip wine!” said Bailey, who has participated in numerous Wine Auction Week events, including the vintner’s dinner.
Twenty cyclists showed up for the Museum’s inaugural Cycle & Sip, which was conceived by Ron Greenspan, the same board member who conceived the very popular River Ranch Wine Walk three years ago.
They biked from the Ketchum Post Office down the bike path single file at eight miles an hour, braving a blizzard of cottonseed as they rolled past two elk grazing on the side of the path. They made three stops along the way before concluding the journey at Roots Wine Bar in Hailey.
“It’s nature and nurture!” said Nancy Goldstein, holding a glass of wine in the air while gesturing towards the Big Wood River and the foothills beyond.
SVMoA board member Adam Kesselman led the journey with the help of Greenspan and Wendy Minervini.
First stop: The Spur art installation at the fork in the bike path just south of Serenade Lane. Commissioned by the SVMoA and the City of Ketchum, it was constructed out of Alaskan yellow cedar by John Grade to celebrate the Craters of the Moon National Park during the National Park Service’s Centennial in 2016.
Kesselman encouraged the bicyclists to run through the 80-foot-long, 13-foot-high sculpture.
“I always thought it was supposed to resemble a dinosaur, but it actually resembles the inside of a lava tube at Craters. The exterior is designed to resemble train tracks in honor of Union Pacific Railroad’s spur line here,” he said.
The bike path is part of the rail-to-trail conversion, and you can still see a few train tracks alongside the path, added Greenspan.
Bicyclists stopped next at the Pegram Bridge just north of the hospital.
Built in 1884 in Ontario, Ore., the Cold Springs Pegram Truss Railroad Bridge was moved here in 1917, Kesselman said. A second Gimlet Pegram Truss Railroad Bridge crosses the Big Wood River just south of East Fork Road. It was moved to the Wood River Valley in 1914 and used until 1981.
“We forget how recently these bridges were used,” said Greenspan.
There are just six of the bridges left in Idaho, Greenspan added. George H. Pegram designed them so that their vertical posts leaned towards the center, enabling each post to be the same length. The uniformity of the posts made them easier to manufacture and ship, said Greenspan. And Pegram was so revered for his invention that even a town in Idaho was named after him.
Of course, it didn’t do to stop at the Pegram Bridge without pointing out the art on the nearby bridge carrying motorists.
The art was commissioned in 2017 by the Department of Transportation, Kesselman said. And each of the six steel sculptures lining the 300-foot, four-span bridge were designed by Kay Kirkpatrick to celebrate local nature.
Sculptures depict aspen leaves, cottonwood trees along the river banks, a snow fence designed to hold back the snow, skis commemorating Sun Valley’s legacy as America’s first destination ski resort and river rocks. One called “Meander” represents the river and the everchanging course it cuts through the valley.
Next stop: Boxcar Bend, named for three boxcars that were placed in the river to mitigate the force of the river which undercut the bank in 1961.
“It didn’t work,” said Greenspan. “A decade later the river undercut the bank again. So, the Wood River Land Trust took charge of seven acres here. It’s a beautiful spot to go down and have a picnic and a fabulous place to fish.”
It was also a fabulous place to have a sip of wine during the 14-mile bike ride to Hailey.
Mary Ann Turrentine and Marilyn Harris of Paradigm Winery greeted the cyclists with smiles and a few bottles of their 2022 Rose of Merlot, a light salmon pink-colored rose with aromas of strawberries, melon and white nectarine.
Harris described how her grandparents moved to Napa Valley in 1893 from Italy. Her father plowed the vineyard with horse and plow and she was born and raised in the valley which, she said, was a sleepy little community way back when.
She and her high school sweetheart Ren, a sixth-generation Californian, married nearly 60 years ago in 1965 and they bought their 55-acre certified organically farmed Oakville, Calif., vineyard in 1975, replanting the original vineyard to Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Zinfandel.
They named it Paradigm, which means symbol of perfection.
Today Paradigm produces estate-bottled wines with winemaker Heidi Barrett, dubbed “The First Lady of Wine” for producing some of California’s most notable cult wines. And the winery is a member of One Percent for the Planet, giving 1 percent of its gross income each year to protect the environment.
“In 1967 we noticed that San Jose was going from agriculture to houses so we decided we had to do something to protect our area, which is 30 miles long and 15 miles wide,” said Harris. “So, we created a agricultural preserve and that put Napa Valley on the map. Pretty soon, the French and Italian were moving in and growing wines.”
The cyclists clearly loved the experience. “Do you have wines we can take with us on our bikes?” quipped one.
“This is a super fun event,” said Kesselman. “And what a great way to pair art, wine and cycling.”