In only its third year, Salute! wine festival in Winston-Salem seems to have ironed out most of the kinks and problems that can come along with running a large carnival of alcoholic beverages.

The extravaganza occurred Saturday.

You could see how hard all of the volunteers were working to assist the wineries, ferrying them supplies, picking up drink sales, and otherwise directing wayward tasters toward other snacks and beverages.

This year they opened a free parking deck for those who couldn't walk to town, making it an even more hassel free experience.

Three downtown city blocks were closed to acommodate 28 wineries, 10 vendors and eight food tents. The entertainment was a mix of three very different bands that played throughout the evening, venturing out into the crowd to occasionally surprise passer-bys with their jubilance.

Tim Grandinetti, Twin City Quarter's executive chef paired together with Nora Sherman, a wine educator from the Clemmons area to educate tourists on the importance of food and wine pairings.

Festival go-ers were positive toward the wines being tasted and seemed to be getting the hang of speed tasting in the crowded atmosphere where a full tasting is never a practical idea. Better to duck in and out, trying first a round of whites everywhere, going back for another round of red, followed by your sweet deserts. At least that's the way I like to do it.

In anticipation of a month's worth of May wine festivals including Salute, Yadkin Valley and Tangelwood, my husband, Justin, and I have been keeping an eye out for who would be new at this year's circuit.

There were several wineries that I knew were recent to the North Carolina wine scene this year like Native Vines, Rendezvous Ridge, and Devaste Vineyards (all of which will also be at the more local Yadkin Valley festival, if you missed them in Winston).

There were also wineries that were older, but I had intentionally skipped in the past years because they served what I would call a sweeter wine.

In a complete reversal of what wine drinkers usually experience, I seemed to, for the first time, really enjoy these sweeter wines this year. Particularly the American muscadine varieties.

It is such a strong and sometimes cloying taste, that I could admire the skill certain vineyards used to balance the grape's attributes in their wines. I found several that I would have liked to buy a half bottle of, but couldn't get Justin to commit to the other half.

It's important to remember to keep challenging your taste buds no matter, which way you are going on the sweetness scale. There have been so many different wines that I have at first sip wanted to swear off on, only to find them my favorite wine after a few more tries. Some tastes truly are acquired, like my father's forcing himself to enjoy cilantro, or Justin's growing appreciation of mushrooms (only cooked!), or my new growing appreciation of sweeter wines.

The bottle we ended up taking home with us that day was an apple wine from Native Vines, that I've already planned to serve with pork chops. But we picked quite a few bottles to watch further vintages of and planned many visits to wineries from our visit with them at Salute.

While we were there we saw a lot of old friends from working in the wine industry, being on the other side of the tasting tent. It's nice to know you will run into not just a few people you've met before at an event of that size and magnitude.

We saw a lot of happy wine reunions throughout the day. With friends asking what other friends thought of this vineyard or that wine, whether they would be at the next event.

Which is great to see because the first time we ever went to Salute, we thought, 'No way is this ever going to work out.' We thought there were way too many festivals for our growing wine scene to commit to, not to mention the burden it can be on those who are pouring. But it seems to be doing very well as one of the first large Yadkin Valley showcases that is close enough to the coast to bring over vineyards like Duplin, which I have not yet been to, but would like to go after meeting such nice people from their vineyard and winery staff.

Whether Yadkin Valley Wine Festival will be the first festival visit of the year, or second or third, you've got to keep trying new tastes and venues while meeting new people. A festival setting is the perfect pairing with an open mind.