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Everyone knows that summer and early fall, when leafy vines are heavy with plump grapes, is the most popular season for touring the Okanagan wine country in central British Columbia. So much so, you'll endure hordes of fellow tourists on the roads and in the tasting rooms (all with visions of picture-postcard snapshots dancing in their heads), high-season hotel rates and withering temperatures.

If that leaves a sour taste in your mouth, but you want to experience the award-winning Nk'Mip and other Okanagan wines at the source, you're ripe for a winter wine tour. With crisp air and a dusting of snow on the vines, the wineries offer a Canadian beauty that, when bundled with bargain rates at hotels and resorts, invite lingering afternoons with room and time to spare.

Free of crowds, you'll be able to chat with the winemakers in their tasting rooms, rather than sipping and running.

“It's a good opportunity to get a lot closer to the actual working winery,” said Lisa Cameron, general manager of the B.C. Wine Institute, the trade association for the province's wine industry. “There's more likelihood that you're going to see the proprietor working the room in the winter than you will in the summer.”

And, of course, winter is the perfect time of year to sample icewine. Like drinking tea on a hot summer day, there's something oddly comforting in sipping a well-chilled icewine when it's brisk outside.

Canadian icewine has been in the news recently for all the wrong reasons: Counterfeits have been flooding the market in China, which is also the top market for genuine Canadian icewines. With icewines selling for about $40 to $80 for a 375-millilitre bottle – and some vintages costing $100 or more – it's a lucrative market. “That's why unscrupulous people are trying to break into it,” Cameron said.

In Canada, government regulation of alcohol sales prevents counterfeit icewines from appearing on store shelves, but be wary of labels that say “ice wine” or “iced wine” – they likely flag wines made from grapes picked when ripe and then commercially frozen, rather than left to freeze on the vine, a requirement for genuine icewine. The latter process is said to produce sweeter, more intensely flavoured grapes, ideal for icewine.

Icewine grapes are usually picked between mid-December and late January. But no amount of planning will guarantee you a ringside seat for the harvest – it's entirely dependent on the weather, which has to drop to -8 Celsius or lower before the frozen grapes can be plucked from the vines.

Last year, most B.C. wineries harvested their icewine grapes between Christmas and New Year's Day. “But there have been seasons here where we haven't picked icewine until January or February,” said Jennifer Busmann of Nk'Mip Cellars (pronounced in-ka-meep), one of the most successful wineries in the region, owned and operated by the Osoyoos Indian Band.

And even if your timing is perfect, you may have to forgo some sleep to witness the harvest. “Nine times out of 10, it's picked in the dark in the middle of the night,” she said.

Nk'Mip's Qwam Qwmt Riesling Icewine has racked up an impressive number of awards for its past three vintages. The riesling grape is high in acidity, which balances the sweetness of the icewine, Busmann explains.

And, it has the all-important tough skin – because they are left on the vine so long, icewine grapes have to endure fluctuating temperatures and cling to the vine until the temperature is cold enough for the harvest.

Mission Hill Family Estate in Kelowna also used riesling grapes for its 2006 icewine, named the world's best icewine at last year's prestigious International Wine Challenge in London. Other Okanagan wineries with award-winning icewines include Jackson-Triggs Okanagan Estate, Gehringer Brothers Estate, Inniskillin Okanagan, the quirkily named See Ya Later Ranch and the certified organic Summerhill Pyramid Winery.

Summerhill's pyramid – a scale model of Egypt's Great Pyramid of Giza – makes it easily identifiable in Kelowna. All Summerhill vintages, including the icewines, develop in the pyramid, which winery owner Stephen Cipes believes has special powers that enhance their character. The parking spots for tour buses outside the tasting room are evidence that Summerhill gets a steady stream of tour groups in the summer, mostly from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan – all major markets for B.C. icewine. For Asian tourists, icewine, Cipes says, is close to replacing maple syrup as a Canadiana souvenir.

But in the winter, the crowds are blissfully absent, and icewine is just one of the vintages you can sample. The Thompson Okanagan region, as it's officially known (it stretches from Osoyoos in the south to Valemount in the north, and Lytton on the west to Sicamous on the east), is home to more than 100 wineries specializing in everything from gewurztraminer to pinot noir. The two largest clusters are between Penticton and Kelowna in the central part of the valley, and Osoyoos and Oliver in the south: In either of these areas, you can easily tour several wineries in one day. If you're interested in a specific winery, it's a good idea to check ahead to make sure its tasting room is open during the winter. Not all are, but most medium to large wineries welcome cold-weather visitors.

If you like what you're tasting, you can buy a bottle or a case at the winery. But if you don't make a purchase, and later wish you had, the Wine Country Visitor Centre in central Penticton has an excellent wine store that stocks vintages from many local wineries. Or, stop at the small but well-stocked wine store at Kelowna International Airport– just make sure you don't fly home with any lingering regrets about wines you've loved and lost.

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Pack your bags

GETTING THERE
Fly into either Kelowna or Penticton via Air Canada, WestJet or, if you're flying from within Alberta or B.C., Central Mountain Air.

WHERE TO STAY
Spirit Ridge Vineyard Resort and Spa 1200 Rancher Creek Rd., Osoyoos; 1-877-313-9463; www.spiritridge.ca. Rooms, in winter, from $125.
Summerland Waterfront Resort 13011 Lakeshore Dr. S., Summerland; 1-877-494-8111; www.summerlandresorthotel.com. Rooms, in winter, from $109.
Hotel Eldorado 500 Cook Rd., Kelowna; 1-866-608-7500; www.hoteleldoradokelowna.com. Rooms, in winter, from $99.

WHEN TO GO
Although April through September is considered the high season in the Okanagan wine country, if you visit outside those months, you'll get better deals on airfare and hotels, and you'll encounter fewer fellow tourists. The Winter Wine Festival, featuring a variety of tasting events and winemakers' dinners, runs from Jan. 16 to 24 at Sun Peaks Resort (www.sunpeaksresort.com), about 50 kilometres northeast of Kamloops.

MORE INFORMATION
The B.C. Wine Institute A wealth of information about wines and wineries in the Okanagan. www.winebc.com.
The Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association 1-800-567-2275; www.totabc.com.

Special to The Globe and Mail