Mount Pleasant Estates — Attraction in Augusta

I worked at this winery about 18 years ago on weekends for fun and to support an acquaintance who was the Director of Operations at that time. Back then it was hands down the best winery in the region both for fun/entertainment, service, value and quality. The wine maker at the time was named Mark and he was a true craftsman producing some of the best Ports I have ever experienced in my life. Went there this past weekend to see a specific entertainer and for nostalgia sake. What a huge mistake. It was as though someone has deliberately destroyed this once fine establishment. It has become totally commercialized and now is simply all about squeezing every last penny out of you that they can. Never used to even be a charge for tasting now it's 10$ each and that is if you can get service at the tasting bar at all. We waited for a good 10 minutes willing to pay 20$ to taste and ID a bottle my companion might like before we gave up and headed to the patio for the show. 5$ cover each to go down to the patio for the music which is reasonable and is the same as 18 years ago when I was the guy sitting at the door collecting the cover charge and sitting on huge stacks of 5's. There was insufficient seating but a nice couple invited us to join them at their table after they observed us standing awkwardly against the retaining wall trying to enjoy the show. For goodness sake just add some more seating, how hard is that? So we go in to get a couple bottles and I almost get sick when I see how much they have inflated the prices. $50 for an average quality bottle of dry red. On top of that another $10 for 2 glasses. I probably still have 20 of the older style Mt. Pleasant glasses at home and used to give them as part of wine gift baskets to friends. We never used to charge a guest for a glass. Thank goodness we had already eaten lunch because the food options were absurdly overpriced and nothing appeared worth the kings ransom they seem to think they can charge. While trying to get our 2 grossly overpriced bottles of wine and glasses the cook was arguing with the cashier over pushing some items they apparently wanted to get rid of and for ringing an order in wrong. The lack of professionalism was frankly absurd! I felt so bad for the cashier being subject to such vicious harassment that I left her the deposit we got back for returning our wine glasses as additional tip $ (must save your receipt if you want your $10 back for the glasses) even though I had just been fleeced out of well over $100 to watch some live music and share 2 bottles. While we never got served at the tasting bar I learned in conversation with the folks who we joined they were charge an additional $12 each for port tasting. If that's the case that's $44 just for a couple to enjoy a comprehensive tasting. That's simply crazy! Not only did we never charge for tasting, the tasting included all of the desert wines which at the time were Mark's creations and some of the best you could ever find anywhere. I guess if you are rich this place may still be awesome. It is still a beautiful estate with a phenomenal view and a rich history. They still provide some great names to perform on the patio. While the quality of the wine is nowhere near what Mark used to put out (Tawney Volume XIII - the best liquid I have ever tasted in my life) it is still good but definitely not worth anything close to to absurdly inflated prices they now charge. Long and short, someone has allowed greed to ruin what was once 10 fold the best winery in the region and whoever is responsible should be ashamed. On the other hand if you are wealthy and have no concern for the value of a hard earned dollar by all means...

Giving two stars only due to the view. A friend of ours had their wedding here last year. Had to wait to write reviews honestly as friend was attempting to work through things. Let me start by saying for the amount of money it takes to get married here , the rehearsal dinner was sub par at best. We had gnats in our drinks, yep gnats. The day of wedding the venue had an event in which guests were not out of the winery on time and then some were in the hill intoxicated being disruptive, what did wedding coordinator do to get them to leave, nothing. Due to having a concert there that day the event was low on beer for the actual wedding reception, what!!! Who allows that to happen? They had one bartender so line to even get beverage was long. The wedding coordinator had to leave event to go get more beer at local store. The dishes for the dinner were still damp from being washed just before as they were dirty from the days events, they just seemed very unprepared for a wedding that day. Luckily our friends just had to make the most of it as you plan a long time for your special day and there were many things this venue could of done better. I had a spinal fusion surgery that I was recovering from and at the end of the night it’s raining , no lights from venue to parking lot so that was also disappointing and quite frankly dangerous. I have been to this winery for pleasure before, enjoyed it, they are a bit pricey however view is good. With so many options for your special day just be sure you take this into consideration as it’s expensive to have your day here . I had tried to leave a Facebook review on a take out page from wedding planner which she deleted , that seemed odd too as all reviews are important so that you can fix what goes wrong but that showed myself and others that integrity went out the window when she(Nancy) deleted our review from her Facebook post. Hope this review helps the venue fix what they need too and others to take this into consideration when or...

COUPLES BEWARE!!! We had our wedding here and that was a HUGE mistake in my opinion, as well as my wife's and most of our guests. You ever meet someone that's so nice it seems fake??? If you do proceed, do so with caution. Get EVERYTHING in writing and into your contract. Be very specific with every single detail, yes even having lights on needs to be in writing, what time you are starting, what time the public will be out of the venue, exact place of everything, no venue employees minor children at your reception. These are some of the things we wish we would have had in our contract. We had disruption in our ceremony with the "non wedding guests" being loud and drunk during the actual ceremony. Wedding guests and some from the wedding party had to go retrieve chairs that were set out for the ceremony as people not there for the wedding kept trying to take them. The venue ran out of liquor prior to the reception even starting because "the day crowd was much larger than anticipated" The coordinator had to go to Wal-Mart to buy more liquor, according to the text she sent me in an attempt to explain all the mishaps. They didn't give us or deposit back that was in the contract. We ended up in litigation and accepting a ruling by the judge in our favor. We were accused of trying to profit from this... Really? What we spent was never to be completely recouped. How could you possibly profit from this? Had the owner just given us the opportunity to speak with him and accepted the responsibility for the actions of his staff, it may have be resolved...