Foxen Vineyards has been a landmark on the Foxen Canyon wine trail for years. With the opening of a second location now you can have twice the Foxen experience.  Their newly completed tasting room has all the amenities and comfort of a well heeled winery- spacious, well appointed, nice patio, good wines and happy people. Foxen pours their Bordeaux wine along with their Sangiovese. To taste the Burgundy and Rhone wines you need to amble down the road 1/2 mile.

The original tasting room, known as the shack, is Located right on the side of the road, this one-of-a-kind tasting experience is housed on a 2,000-acre ranch in a tin-roofed converted blacksmith’s shop. The winery building sits back a few yards from the road and was once the area’s official stagecoach stop.  Queenie and Yahee are the official canine greeters of this rustic oasis.

The open-air tasting “room” leads outside onto a long narrow deck with benches and tables looking over the Sisquoc riverbed. The property was originally part of a 9,000-acre Mexican land grant, and was purchased in 1837 by Sea Captain William Foxen. Originally named Rancho Tinaquaic, the ranch is still in family hands and home to cattle ranching and winemaking by the patriarch’s
great-great-grandson.

Captain Foxen adopted the anchor design as his ranch cattle brand, and this is also the winery’s trademark. Foxen Winery makes small-production vineyard-designated wines using a “minimalist” approach. Across the street is a portion of their vineyard holdings, which are currently growing Chardonnay. The winery sources grapes from other Santa Ynez Valley vineyards and produces Chenin Blanc, Sangiovese Volpino, Syrah, Pinot Noir, late harvest Viognier and Bordeaux, Tuscan and Rhone blends.