I’m not sure if I’ve shared this much on the blog yet but Ryan and I are huge fans of wine. This has love has developed over time and increased in affection for me especially as the years have gone by. I used to be all about red wine but now I have realized that white wine has a place in my life; heck even a rosé has a time and a place 🙂 .
With our love of wine, we have made a handful of trips (5 to be exact) to the Napa/Sonoma areas of California. On the first trip we went to all of the “touristy” wineries and did a few tours based on recommendations from others. After our first trip, we realized that we liked the smaller wineries because they are more likely to have a conversation with you about their wine and will let you taste their “special” wines more often. Smaller wineries are more likely to waive tasting fees with bottle purchases. Also, they rarely distribute their wines outside of the region so it feels more exclusive than tasting something I can pick up at my local liquor store.
A great way to enjoy non-distributed wines is to become club members because then they will ship you wine and you get member perks like discounted wines and free tastings. None of the wineries we are members of have any fees so it is just the cost of the wine shipments. I think last year we were members to 4 wineries….we had cut down to 3 but then just joined another one during our current wine country trip. Also, when you are member, the wineries will treat you like a king and queen and let you try anything you want (well the smaller wineries will at least).
This past weekend, we made our 6th trip to wine country and since we’ve been to Napa/Sonoma area many times, we have a “routine” now….
We’ve stayed at hotels and B&B’s and both have nice perks so we tend to do both during our travels. We usually end up staying at one of the Inns owned by one of the wineries where we are members (we get a discount because of that) in the Healdsburg area because it gives us the opportunity to be close to Sonoma wineries. The Inn has nice perks like an amazing breakfast each day, wine and appetizer hours, fresh cookies and coffee and really nice rooms. We also tend to stay in Calistoga or on the outskirts of Napa because hotels are more affordable and it gets us closer to Napa area wineries. We will usually just stay at a chain type hotel in these areas because they are affordable and sometimes they have a pool (although we tend to go in the off season so pools aren’t always open). For our trip this weekend, we did just that; stayed at a hotel in Calistoga for two nights and then stayed at the Inn in Headsburg for two nights.
For food, we’ve done everything from getting snacks for a picnic in a local state park to eating at French Laundry (a ridiculously expensive french restaurant). We seem to land somewhere in the middle now for restaurants. We tend to spend at least one meal just eating bread and cheese and a bottle of wine from one of the wineries we visited because eating out for every meal during vacations gets old. For our trip this weekend, we ate at around one sit-down restaurant per day and then for other meals we grabbed food on the go from specialty shops.
For wineries, we focus on the ones we are members at because of the free tastings and king treatment. However, we do like to try a few new ones each year as well because it’s nice to try new things 🙂 . For our trip this time we hit up the ones we are members at including Girard, Sequioa Grove, and a handful of the Wilson Family Wineries. Then we also went to Tank (a locals recommendation) and Chateau Montelena (we joined their membership now). One of the best ways to find good wineries isn’t always on Google. It is through recommendations of friends, family and locals in the area. My two favorite wineries right now are Girard and Sequioa Grove, which both were recommendations from friends and locals.
Lastly, no trip to anywhere is complete without a marathon run by Ryan and a wine country trip is no different. Ryan ran the Napa Valley marathon for the third time this past weekend. He got his second best marathon time ever at 3:35:12. We have learned through trial and error that it is best NOT to do a significant amount of wine tastings the day before the marathon 🙂 . I have also found a good routine for spectating the marathon as well, which is beautiful in wine country.
The winner of the marathon wins their weight in wine. I would like to say that Ryan won, but he did not. I think we have pretty much purchased his weight in wine anyway along our trip so we’re covered 😉 . Speaking of wine purchases….one more thing is that as you purchase wine, you have to find a way to bring it home. We use three different distribution methods: put it in checked luggage (make sure they mark it “fragile”), ship from the winery if we are buying a case from there or ship from one of the wine shipment stores.
You may have noticed there wasn’t any mention of our girls in this post. Well that’s because they don’t come with to wine country…..it just doesn’t make sense for them to come so they stay with their grandparents. They have loads of fun spending time with them and we have loads of fun wine tasting, it is a win win.
Have you been to wine country? What’s your favorite wineries to visit?
