Day began very early. I got up around 3am and started blogging about the day before. I was able to catch a few zzz’s in between but basically had an early jump on things. Unfortunately, the TV was busted and the front desk couldn’t do anything about it, so we couldn’t keep up-to-date on the French Open. We took advantage of the jogging course. I couldn’t believe it, but Su actually did 3 fast laps of the .5 mile loop. Anyone who knows Su knows that is a mighty feat. I wasn’t feeling very good as I had an Atkins shake before the run and my stomach was a bit topsy-turvy. But that didn’t keep me from having some breakfast. Since the food sounded good, I opted for the specialty omelette. Pretty hard to argue with Gouda cheese, hash browns and chicken sausage all combined (even with some veges).

Anyway, enough of the fluff….to the wine!

We decided to start the day at Chalk Hill Winery. This place was pretty clever in their advertising. If you check out the web site here, you will see that they have directions that are not to scale. This is because if you realized how far out of the way it was, you probably wouldn’t have driven there. That being said, the place was pretty beautiful. They own a *lot* of land so they can pretty much do what they please(eg dedicate land to horse dancing). Unfortunately, the beauty of the place didn’t translate into the wine. Or stated differently, I don’t think that the wine was as good as the price suggested. For example, their dessert wine was $120 for a half bottle and I thought not as good as $20 competitors. We did pick up two bottles of Syrah to salvage the trip.

Then it was up north to Geyserville to make a return visit (first time was 2 years ago) to the Meeker Winery. Meeker is one of the producers that doesn’t grow any grapes. They just buy the fruit from vendors and do the mixing. I’m not sure if the lack of an estate is what keeps their costs down, but all of their wine costs a lot less than say Chalk Hill. And the best part is that they taste great. We went through a lot of wines and I was able to convince Su to let me get 1.5 cases. At this point (only the 2nd of many more days), we already have ordered more than we can store. What does this mean? Wine Party! Or maybe another bigger stronger chiller!

We headed south to Simi (another return visit). The wine hostess was the same as last time. She was an Australian lady from Melbourne. After joking if she has an animosity to Kiwis, she said there is more of a rivalry against Sydney. Sorry Paul, I guess this means she’s off the market. Wines here were good and thankfully not as pricey as Chalk Hill. I ended up joining the wine club (hard to resist the 20% discount) and we picked up a half case to send ourselves. The hostess was very nice and gave us a styro shipping box (case-size) for free. She also confirmed the awesomeness of our next destination.

And that would be the Bear Republic Brewery. Located in the heart of Healdsburg, I have to say that though I had to actually pay for the beer (compared to Lagunitas), it was tasty along with the bacon(yum) covered cheeseburger (recommended by the wine hostess). Unfortunately, we only had time for a beer each as we had to make our way to Napa (not to mention we were both feeling quite full).

Unfortunately, the fullness kept us out of other Sonoma wineries even though we had time before the closing. And double unfortunately, the drive was long and in the hottest sunniest part of the day. Fear not, we arrived in Yountville around 4:45 and began to chill-out. Stomach fullness continued into the evening, so no dinner for us even though we are in the heart of awesome restaurants in Napa.

Tomorrow is another day. Fresh, with no food in it…yet.

After a good nights sleep, Su and I got up relatively late(7am) and put on our workout gear. With surprising little prodding I convinced Su to go for a jog. It’s really quite odd that Su likes (or at least is more amenable) to go running on vacation than other times. Anyway, they (Vintner’s Inn) have a nice 2 mile jogging path that goes around some vineyards. The temperature was cool and it was a great morning for a run. You may be thinking Dave, why would you run on your vacation? Short answer is that we do consume quite a bit of calories between eating and drinking and this is but a small price to pay for all the yummy stuff.

Anyway, we had a lot of time to kill that morning because the appointment at Jordan wasn’t until 11 (even factoring in a half hour + 15 min wait time). Most wineries open their tasting room at 10 so not too bad considering.

I haven’t really had much Jordan wine so I didn’t know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised with both their Chardonnay and this aged dessert wine. Funnily enough they are known for their Cabs but those really didn’t blow me away at all (Su agreed). What did amaze me was the length of the tour and how much they were trying to sell the image of the winery. I kept thinking when will the drinking part of the tasting actually begin?

When it came to the decision time, Su and I stuck to our guns about buying later. After all, we only have about 30 free slots in our wine chillers so space was precious.

The next winery was Sausal. I wanted to turn in when I saw their sign: olde vine Zinfandel. For those who don’t know, older vines yield less but give much greater flavor. A lot of the bigger producers will change their vines after 20-30 years. This place had ages between 50 and 130 (vines not people). There is a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ about the flavor of the old vine zin that I love and Su hates but we always find some middle ground. We decided to buy 2 bottles (90 and 100 year vines) to try out before buying more. Yeah I know I said we would wait but the price was reasonable and I really like Zins.

Next on the list was a recommendation from one of Su’s co-workers called Hanna. Let me cut to the chase and say we bought a lot of wine from them(3 cases). Just about everything the lady poured (and she poured a lot) was just plain fantastic. Maybe the alcohol was getting to me but it really was delicious. Suffice it to say that I am now a member of 7 wine clubs.

We spent enough time at Hanna that we had to skedaddle to head south to Petaluma for the 3pm brewery tour at Lagunitas. Due to traffic we were a little late, but since we were the only ones the lady didn’t seem to mind. In what I think is a non traditional tour we started at the bar. I drank everything at the bar and parts of several bottles. A beer called Little Sumpin’ took the prize in my book. Su is not much of a beer drinker but I give her credit for trying everything and agreeing that my top beer had a certain something (pun intended). The tour was interesting in two ways: 1) I felt like I was at the beginning of Lavergne and Shirley with all the bottles moving around in the assembly line 2) these two 6ft5 guys showed up later than us for the tour. They missed the bar time but were allowed to each bring a free bottle (750 ml) of their choice on the tour. I was also carrying beer so you can imagine I wasn’t driving to our next destination.

Due to traffic and a desire to not have a big drive post dinner and the fact that we only had a small continental breakfast we decided on a early dinner and going to eat at a different place (although it also began with Willi’s). Dinner was unfortunately kind of bland and uninteresting. And I drank too much which had me asleep way too early. But hey, this means I can blog at 3am and not mind the iPhone keyboard too much.

So the trip began with a flight delay. What was amusing/annoying was the reason for the delay. They claimed that there was too much fog in San Francisco so the flow rate into the airport was reduced. I get that. So we take off with a half hour delay. But then we arrive early! Very confusing.

Anyway, we then have the joy–nay, the privilege–to wait in line to pay for the rental car that we already paid via the Internet. Perhaps it’s the economy or maybe the status quo but it seems as though all of the salespeople were wearing suits in the hope that they can sell you more stuff that you would have bought already if you wanted it. I would go so far to say that the guy we had gave us the hard sell to NOT get an economy car because it didn’t have power locks or windows. Su and I both thought do they even make cars without power anything anymore? Suffice it to say that after we didn’t upgrade the guy who showed us to the car(also wearing a suit) tried to scare us to get the insurance fee protection (this isn’t insurance) which we also refused.

We met up with Don for an early dinner at Monks Kettle which is a great restaurant with 20 draft beers in the Mission district. Area looks a bit dodgy but hard to argue with the fare. Summary: pepper crusted bacon is awesome.

So as we stopped to figure out directions we turned on the hazard lights. Little did we know that we wouldn’t be able to turn them off(thank you automobile industry). Not wanting to spend the rest of the trip with the constant clicking and flashing we made our way back to the airport to get a new car. We traded our chevy ? for a Nissan versa. Jury is still out on whether or not we traded down.

And I almost forgot the best part. On the way back to the airport we were pulled over by the police because of the lights. At least we got a discount from Enterprise for the hassle.

Drive to Sonoma from that point was largely uninteresting other than Google Maps giving us the wrong directions for the last turn.

Su and I are getting ready for a trip to Napa and Sonoma Valley by making space in the wine fridges. It’s a tough job, but somebody has to do it. Starting Sunday night, I will be doing daily write-ups of our activities and all the specifics of the wines we like and dislike. Stay tuned.

Crazy you say?

Yes, well, it’s hard to resist the Woz and Steve-o on the same show together.  The former probably thinks it’s a lark and the latter is trying to figure out new ways to embarass himself.

This is reality tv at it’s finest (aka most entertaining).

I think it is quite overwhelming and there is a lot of information.

Why so sad?

Let me list the causes:

I’m virtually last in my fantasy league with zero chance of seeing any return on my money.

The bears need a small miracle to make it to the playoffs.

Too many non Sunday afternoon football games. For example the bears played on last thursday and will not play again until Monday. The worst part of that is that they could be knocked out before their game starts with a Vikings win.

Anyway, I’ll be metaphorically doing some live animal sacrifice to ensure a positive outcome.