Wine Country Visit

I think this might just be our very first wine tasting trip of 2013.....we are working way too much.  Off we go with our Wine Rock Star friends to a "pairing" at St. Francis.

The weather was perfect and the grounds are absolutely beautiful. The staff is friendly, unpretentious, and they all are informed and passionate about wine.  They were debuting a new menu and everything was really tasty. The wine is very good quality and the prices remain a good value (especially since our friends are wine club members so we share the discount). We were hoping to find a few items for a wedding shower gift and we did score several nice items in their gift shop. We loaded the car and were off to the other side of the hill, to Napa.

Sequoia Grove is a sister winery of St. Francis so our friends get free tastings and super discounts. This is a very small winery located in a grove of redwoods, hence the name. We had a great time here. Our pourer was Sarah and she was fantastic. We tried a few wines, she took us down for a quick tour of the cellars where we did a barrel tasting (and I'm pretty sure I need to come back in a few years to buy some when it's ready), and then we sat at a table in the grove tasting the high end stuff. Sarah's pours were very generous and we had reached out limit...or some of us had reached our limit. We did find a couple more items to add to the shower gift, SCORE!

We had a stop to pick up wine at Onward, chat with the winemaker Faith, and play with her new little girl, Chloe. Our final pick up was at Acacia. We arrived just after they closed, so we knocked and they actually opened up and offered us up a quick tasting while they got the wine club shipment. We did buy a few bottles so everything worked out for all of us.

By now it was the commute time and we had been tasting all day (except for our DD, designated driver). We wisely chose to grab dinner and then head home.

Our wine closest is now full. Time to kick back on the patio and open a bottle.