Sonomy County:
Wine Country, Northern California, 2006!

All photos taken by me.   (Just thought I 'd throw that in)  : )

My friend Greg and I (and Mookie, the Travel Cow) spent a week on a
road trip to Sonoma County, CA. It was cloudy during most of our
trip, but it only rained once: at night.

This was a road trip. We even stopped by Seven Feather's Casino, where I
won $11.25 in only 4 minutes! After a one-night stop-over in Grants Pass, OR,
we drove sw on HWY 199 through SW Oregon, and NW California. Then, when we
got to Crescent City, CA, we switched over to south-bound Interstate 101.
That highway had us twisting and turning through redwood forests for a
few hours, and then led us down through valleys full of grape vines.

We stayed at the TrendWest/WorldMark in Windsor, CA -- about 70 miles north
of San Francisco. We went to several, but certainly not all of the area's
many, many wineries. We focused mostly in the Russian River Valley's
wineries:

    Roshambo Winery (UPDATE-2010: this place is now a farm)
    Rochioli Vineyards
    Davis Bynum (this is the first winery we visited)
        (UPDATE-2010: vineyards and winery facilities are now Thomas George Estates)
    Porter Creek
    Moshin Vineyards
    Gary Farrell
    Rodney Strong
    J Vineyards
    Everett Ridge

...and in Healdsburg, (just north of Windsor), we visited these tasting rooms:

    Toad Hollow
    La Crema
    Thumbprint Cellars

The roads in the area are tight and twisty, and due to a very rainy winter, were
covered with bumpy patches. It made for a lot of bumpy road jokes and rattled
bladders (drinking lots of water and riding bumpy roads is NOT recommended!)
At the same time, they are an absolute treasure to see, coming from a city
dweller. The trees, grapevines, rivers and creeks all make for some wonderful
memories.

We ventured outside the area a couple of times; heading once to see Guerneville
(apparently pronounced 'gurn-ville'), and also headed to the coast, where we had
lunch at Bodega Bay.

We also spent an afternoon in Healdsburg (about 5 miles
north of Windsor). We went to a few wine tastings and window shopped. We found
a cheese that we both thought was exceptionally good (Bellwether Farms, Crescenza
Soft-Repened Cheese), and visited a wood furniture shop where I think I mentally spent
about $30,000. :-)

We went to one wine-food pairing tasting, at J Vineyards winery. I forgot what foods
they served, but thanks to the Internet, I found someone else who had the same things.
So, here's the skinny on what we had:

        "...they paired a sparkling wine with smoked salmon, dill creme
        fraiche and candied kumquat on an endive leaf. With their pinot
        gris they had a cornmeal cracker with goat cheese. With the pinot
        noir they had a mixed mushroom torte and with the zinfandel they
        had an earthy duck or goose liver pate on crostini."

...and MAN, were they tasty!!!

When we headed for home, we decided to drive through Napa Valley. Man, is that
a big, flat valley. And it's stuffed with grapevines. And they have some
amazing looking wineries there -- some of them looked like modern castles: HUGE!
We continued east via hwy 29/Trinity Road -- which took us past some crazy-big
homes with panoramic views of the valley, and then over to I-505 and I-5.
One more stop-over night in Grants Pass, and then we were home the next day.

We did stop one more time, though: Greg's mother made us a wonderful lunch:
homemade waffles topped with fresh strawberries, rasperries and whipped cream,
bacon, and a homemade latte that was SOOOOO nummy!


Take heed: this linked page is about 30 megabytes -- it'll take a while to load:
Bulk pictures of the trip (in chronological order) are here.

Wine Inventory:

Sterling Vintner's Collection (bought at grocery store)
2003 Shiraz
$13.50

Porter Crek
2002 Syrah - Timbervine Ranch
$36.00 x3 = $108.00 (had a bottle one night and liked it enough to buy 2 more!)

Davis Bynum
2003 Pinot Noir
$30

Moshin Vineyards
2004 Banyan Viognier
$15.00 x2 = $30.00 (one is a gift)

Moshin Vineyards
2000 Moshin Vineyards Syrah
$22.00

Toad Hollow
2003 Merlot
$16.99

La Crema
2004 Pinot Noir - Anderson Valley
$29.00 x2 = $58.00

Everett Ridge
2002 Zinfandel - Dry Creek Valley
$19.80 (10% discount off of $22.00)

Thumbprint Cellars
2004 Pinot Noir - Russian River Valley
$32.00

Rodney Strong
2002 Merlot
$19.00 (I had a glass of this at dinner the previous night, and really enjoyed it.
    The wine tasting assistant was overworked and stressed, but the wine was tasty!)

J Vineyards
2005 Pinot Gris
$20.00 (is a gift)

Gary Farrell
2003 Chardonnay - Starr Ridge
$38.00

Gary Farrell
2003 Zinfandel - Dry Creek Valley / Maple Vineyard - Tina's Block
$36.00

Total = $443.29

Here's a detailed breakdown of the landmarks we visited during the trip, including arrival
times (major landmarks are in bold):

- 30 -

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