Saturday – Calistoga to Napa!
Hello!
We have actually had a really lovely day – but it appears
that there is something wrong with the hotel’s connection to the web, so will
probably have to wait and post this on Sunday from San Francisco.
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Up this morning at the usual time, and walked down the block
into downtown Calistoga about 7. Found
the Café Sarafornia on Main Street and decided to have breakfast. We both had the same thing – side orders of
ham and hashbrowns; very good! Then back
to Washington Street, and a quick walk-through the farmer’s market that was
just setting up. We had decided on a
plan for the day yesterday – thinking two wineries in the morning and two in
the afternoon, with lunch hopefully at Domaine Chandon (counting as one of the
wineries). But, as all good plans are
subject to change…we decided that since we have been schlepping the big picnic
basket with us everywhere, we should actually use it! So, as I’d picked up some good cheeses
yesterday at the Dry Creek General Store, we headed to the local market for
picnic supplies. We got some good French
bread, had some salami sliced, some green apples, and got a container of an
excellent potato salad with bacon and blue cheese. Now, we’re all set!
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From there, we headed out to the Calistoga suburbs to
Chateau Montelena, the first stop on our list.
If anyone has seen the movie “Bottle Shock” (Alan Rickman,
Bill Pullman and Chris Pine) you will know lots of information about Chateau
Montelena, as this was the winery who won the French competition in 1972, which
really put Napa Valley on the map! “Dad”
(played by Bill Pullman) has recently passed away, and the winery is now
operated by his son Bo, played by Chris Pine in the movie. Well…first of all, the grounds and buildings
here are stunning. They have a large
pond which even has two islands on it, which you can reserve for picnics, if
you call ahead. We had a lovely tasting
of five wines – and fell in love with several of them. (The problem, we’re finding, is that some of
these wineries don’t make anything we don’t like! Bummer!)
We had a nice walk through their buildings, and their grounds; it’s very
odd tasting wines at 9:30 in the morning … but I could definitely get used to
this!
From Chateau Montelena, we turned the car south, down the
Silverado Trail, and headed to Rombauer, one of our long-time favorites. Here as well, it was difficult finding wines
that we didn’t want to buy … let us only say that we are now bringing home over
two cases of wine in all…how we’re ever going to fit into our room in San
Francisco, I’ll never know!
Rombauer also has a lovely garden on their grounds, which we
toured as well as their tasting room. By
now it was almost lunch time, but we still had to find a Wells Fargo bank. So, headed to St. Helena to pick up cash, and
then used the opportunity to take a walk up and down the main street
there. Unfortunately, we ran into an
olive oil-type store – so, now we not only have wine to bring home, but olive
oil and garlic salt as well! (Our little
car is going to explode…)
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Headed back to Calistoga at this point, to have a wonderful
picnic on our back balcony – along with some wonderful Dry Creek Chenin Blanc…after
which, it was definitely NAP TIME! So
yes, I have to admit – rather than tasting away in the afternoon, we opted to
have a good snooze in front of the football game on TV! (We are SOOOOOO bad!)
Out again about 5 to find someplace for dinner. To be honest, we are both really tired of
having to eat out all the time…so we opted for the nearest Panera, which
happened to be in Napa. A LOT of traffic
getting down Highway 29, so we eventually turned off on to the Silverado Trail,
which was much less congested. We both had
salads at Panera, and then back to the hotel where we’re in for the night!
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Tomorrow we head to San Francisco! Very much looking forward to it … but
honestly, even looking forward to getting home more!
Much love,
m
xxx
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