Sonoma wine

 Ah, Reader,

This is, alas, the last blog of the trip.  Dag-na-bit!

The day started with an Uber ride to the meeting spot for the bus to wine country.  Hilariously, about 8 of us are standing on the sidewalk and these two women come around the corner RUNNING (or what passes for running in 30-something women who don’t run) up the hill towards…well, they came back walking.  They were with our group. 😂

It is an hour plus ride from North Point San Fran to the Sonoma Valley.  We stopped at the scenic view place. 

Our bus driver/guide talked incessantly the whole hour.  One factoid I didn’t know was that the Golden Gate Bridge (obviously pictured above) and the Bay Bridge (pictured later) were built simultaneously in the ‘30s.  Amazing.  No one would try such a thing today.  ):

We went to 3 wineries in “Napa.”  Actually, none were in “Napa” and only one was in the lower Napa Valley.  The other two were in the Sonoma valley, which is the next valley west and (acc to the incessant talk) grows more grapes.  The first place was Muscardini, which was blah.  Their charcuterie board was good, though overpriced. 

The second place was B R Cohn.  Cohn was the manager for the Doobie Brothers for 45 years and bought the farm in the early 70s and the Doobie Brothers have played there 26 times.  There’s a stage in front of the vineyard. 

RR liked their Malbec (a rare varietal in California) and their Chardonnay and Cab Sav.  

Then to Sonoma (the town) for lunch.  It is a town of 10,000, we were told at least twice.  We had Mexican, which was not great. 

Then to Madonna, which is special in that it is an organic estate winery.  Estate means they only make wine from the grapes from their land (there is a lot of buy and selling grapes to make various wines in wine regions).  The host, Caitlin, was a gas, but the wine…meh. 

Back to San Fran.  Google maps said the quickest way to the hotel was trolley over the hill and then a bus.  Google didn’t know it’d be THREE trolleys before we got on (we weren’t alone with this idea).  I don’t think we got a good picture. 

The conductor was a card.  Working on material.  He heard the one couple was from Australia.  “I heard you’re from Australia, I want to talk to you.  I heard they’ve got a kid friendly dog down there…can you help me get one?  I think it’s called a dingo.”  I groaned.  He had several of these.  Mistook the people from Ohio for Michiganders (ouch!), and claimed at one point to be from Cologne.  I missed the follow up to that. 

Then to dinner at the Waterbar.  It is on the Embarcadero, almost right under the Bay Bridge (pic). This has become a tradition, going back to ‘14 with M&S.  This time the choices and my dinner was a bit disappointing (I had the turmeric brined mahi mahi), until…

They brought the dessert menu and I told RR it was her turn to choose and she chose the toffee pudding. Well, before they brought it, they brought it to the couple on my left (again, we sat close together).  I watched and he took one bite and he made this sound of “oh my god!”  I laughed and said to him I guess it was good and he was all “it’s unbelievable.”  We laughed at how excited he was (including him) — “I was only going to take a bite, but now…”

After tasting it, we agreed it was ThAT good.  About as good as a dessert can be without being made of chocolate. 

And that was a good way to finish.  Tomorrow, we grab breakfast and backtrack to the airport.  

Note: we decided to not rent a car.  It turned out to be a brilliant move.  We had no problem using public transportation, and a few ubers and a taxi, and feel like we saved mucho donero.  I wish we could in Ireland next month.  But we won’t bother with a car in London.

That trip and those blogs are only 3+ weeks away.  And boy will I have material with the kid and two brother-in-laws along. 

Till then, much love…

The Intrepid Traveler.