Paccielo Vineyard Owner Bill Schweitzer Recalls Early Days

Bill Schweitzer owns Paccielo Vineyard off Highland Valley Road. He doesn’t make wine. He grows grapes which have gone into many of the wines made in the Ramona Valley Vineyard Association (RVVA) area today. A wine region has to begin with growing grapes, and Schweitzer definitely ranks among the founding fathers of the Ramona wine community.

Schweitzer helped establish the RVVA in 2001. In 2003, he was one of the writers of the petition to the Tax and Trade Division of the U.S. Treasury Department’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms requesting that the Ramona Valley be designated an American Viticultural District.

I asked Schweitzer how he felt about the upholding of the Tiered Winery Ordinance by San Diego County Superior Court.

“It was exactly the correct ruling,” Schweitzer said, "and a real feather in the cap of the vineyard association.” He said the county incorporated a lot of the research done by the RVVA for the language of the Tiered Winery Ordinance. They'd taken some of the suggestions for the first version, which was ultimately rescinded, but incorporated more for the latest one.

Schweitzer's roughly 6-acre vineyard includes 1 acre of Cabernet, two-thirds acre of Sangiovese, and 2.5 acres of Brunello. There’s also an acre of Viognier, which Schweitzer described as “a French white wine grape that grows in warm temperatures,” and an acre of Aglianico, which he called “the red grape of Naples."

"Aglianico grapes from my vineyard were in the wine that won Joe Cullen [of Cactus Star Vineyard at Scaredy Cat Ranch] a gold medal at last year’s Lum Eisenman Wine Competition,” Schweitzer said.

Schweitzer stressed that he sells only to winemakers in the valley because “we’re trying to establish an identity for grapes grown in Ramona, so we should be making wine in Ramona.”

He bought his 16-acre Ramona property in 2000 while still working as a software engineer in Silicon Valley. Schweitzer now operates Sky Valley Network, an Internet service provider in Ramona. Back in 2000, he was thinking of growing avocados but became concerned about how much water they needed. He also feared too many were already being grown.

Then while on a visit to Schwaesdall Winery, he saw a notice about an upcoming class on grape growing being held at the Bernardo Winery under the auspices of the San Diego County Vintners Association. He attended the class in February 2000.

Schweitzer planted his first grapes in January 2001. He eventually combined two Italian words to name his vineyard: "pace" (peace) and "cielo" (sky). In February 2001, he and a group including Bill Jenkin, the late Frank Karlsson, Don Kohorst and John Schwaesdall founded the RVVA.

“There is just good, clean fun about being a farmer, and it’s a real crusade about growing good grapes,” Schweitzer said. He offered a quote he said was from Lum Eisenman: “You can make bad wine from good grapes but you can’t make good wine from bad grapes.” Schweitzer said his goal, and that of all Ramona Valley growers, is “to make good grapes.”

Schweitzer spoke enthusiastically of how growing grapes saves agricultural land, saves open space and “makes a great environment for songbirds.” He said he’s seen more bluebirds on his land since planting grapes than he’d seen previously.

He said it’s satisfying to have made this progress and to be part of what he called the transition of the Ramona Valley wine region.

“Stage one was to plant good vineyards; stage two—make good wine. Stage three is establishing the Ramona identity. You can’t jump ahead.”