Day 13-14 Wine Country to the San Francisco Bay

On June 25th Lauren and I woke up, well rested at the Fairfield Inn and Suites in beautiful Napa Valley (well, technically we were in American Canyon but who's counting!)

World famous Napa Valley

For the first time all trip I felt like I was returning to familiar territory. I felt that way because seven years earlier I flew from Chicago to San Francisco where my good buddy Doug was living at the time. After a couple of days in the city he and I headed north to slurp and gargle our way through some of my favorite vineyards.  Swap out my good buddy for my main squeeze and this trip was equally more fun but decidedly more romantic!

She likes her bubbles!

As do I!

Drinking Cabernet in front of Cabernet vines!

Cabernet grapes, before and after fermentation (I prefer the one's on the right)

Even Squirrelly likes Cabernet!

One of the tasting rooms provided soil samples of the different micro-climate soils from different parts of the valley. I clearly had to sniff each and try to see if I could match the wine to the soil. 

This is how I feel about wine.

After an afternoon of wine drinking Lauren and walked around downtown Napa (which was actually fairly disappointing) and then headed back to the hotel. 

We started the day with ambitious plans for a vineyard-side picnic but when the time to eat came, all we wanted was some good Mexican food, and some chill time at the hotel, so that's exactly what we did. 

Overall it was a very relaxed trip to wine country, which was exactly what we needed before heading off to the hustle and bustle of San Francisco!

-Dan