Terra Trails Winery

In January 2023, I was invited to a sneak preview wine tasting of Terra Trails Winery wines at the home of co-owners Jorge and Marrisa Montalvo. Also present was Jason Guerrero, the winery’s winemaker.

I was very impressed with the 2019 wines and also learned that Jorge was an incredible chef who was continuing to refine his culinary skills.

Food from Preview Tasting

Fast forward to June 2025, and the Terra Trails Winery tasting room has opened in Johnson City. I knew I had to make the trip to Johnson City to visit my friends and see what was new. Fortunately, the drive from San Antonio, where I now live, was a lot shorter than coming from Houston.

The winery was easy to find since it is right on the main drag of U.S. 281, soon after arriving in Johnson City from the south. I didn’t get far out of my car when Jason Guerrero came outside and greeted me. He led me into the tasting room, and the first thing I noticed was directly ahead. It was the wall mural containing a grapevine with a long cordon and the Terra Trails Winery logo painted on the wall. Jason then pointed out how the wooden shelf near the bottom of the grapevine represented the soil of the grapevine. Some grapevine roots remained, and the rest were painted to show how the roots would have been underneath the soil. Overall, it was a very cool mural with a lot of detail.

Jason showed me around the tasting room, and soon Jorge Montalvo approached and took over while Jason went to help some customers.

Jorge presented the winery’s current tasting menu, and there is a fee for five wines. At the time of my visit, the menu consisted of these wines:

2024 Picpoul Blanc – Alta Loma Vineyard, Texas High Plains
2024 Malbec Rosé – Peters Prairie Vineyard, Texas Hill Country
2021 Dolcetto – Bingham Family Vineyards, Texas High Plains
2020 Roots (60% Sangiovese, 40% Malbec)
2019 Mourvèdre – Farmhouse Vineyards, Texas High Plains

By the time you read this, Terra Trails Winery will also be releasing its new 2024 Sparkling Sauvignon Blanc. Also available as Library Wines were the 2019 wines I tasted back during my preview tasting.

Best-selling wines right now in order are the 2020 Roots, 2024 Picpoul Blanc, 2024 Malbec Rosé, 2019 Mourvèdre, and 2021 Dolcetto. If any of those sound enticing, you should visit the winery before they are gone.

The 2019 Petit Verdot and 2019 Tempranillo received Gold medals at the 2025 Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo Vine 2 Wine International Wine Competition, while the 2019 Mourvèdre and 2019 Malbec received Silver medals.

Terra Trails prefers to have the red wines spend no less than three years in barrels and two years in the bottle if possible. They prefer using Hungarian and French oak barrels along with neutral barrels. One thing they enjoy doing is experimenting and trying different ways to make their wine.

One thing upcoming at the winery is a food menu with Jorge handling the chef’s duties. They have already been trying different food offerings, and from the social media photos I have seen, they look as luscious as the food Jorge prepared when I first did a preview of the wines. The winery will also be preparing the outside rear of the tasting room for seating when the temperatures are a little cooler.