Hill Country Wine and the Peach Belt
Near Fredericksburg, Texas
Two agricultural industries have given modern Fredericksburg its character as a destination, and they run side by side along the roads of Gillespie County. The first is peaches. Gillespie County produces some of the finest peaches grown in Texas, with about six hundred acres of orchards growing more than twenty varieties that ripen in sequence between late May and mid-August.
The combination of elevation, well-drained limestone soil, and a significant difference between daytime and nighttime temperatures during the growing season produces fruit with a depth of flavor that commercial growers in warmer, flatter country find difficult to match. Roadside stands line United States Highway Two Ninety through the summer months, and some orchards allow customers to pick their own fruit directly from the trees. The second industry is wine.
The Texas Hill Country American Viticultural Area, established in nineteen ninety-one, covers a large portion of the Edwards Plateau, and Gillespie County sits near its center. Vineyards and tasting rooms have multiplied along the highway corridors near Fredericksburg over the past three decades, drawing visitors from San Antonio and Austin and beyond. The combination of a historic German town, working peach orchards, and a developing wine trail has made Fredericksburg one of the most visited small cities in Texas year-round.
The Hill Country landscape that the Adelsverein settlers found in eighteen forty-six, rocky and demanding, has been persuaded over two centuries to yield peaches, grapes, and a steady stream of travelers.
