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| RSV caves |
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| Getting a taste of the "angel's share" |
Another glorious weather day (90's sunny, breezy) here in wine country began with our last trade tour at Robert Sinskey Vineyard (RSV). Wow, what a great experience. Our morning began again at 10:00. With a generous pour of Riesling in hand, we set off for a private cave tour with our host and the assistant wine maker. We were not only shown some behind-the-scenes areas, we were also given a barrel taste from the aging 2012 Merlot vintage (Tom, honestly, you would have loved it!). They called it the angel's share, which really refers to the amount in each barrel that is lost to evaporation, but who were we to complain about a little extra loss that ended up in our glass?
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| RSV Library Room |
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| RSV Kitchen - Yes, Rick is drooling. |
This vineyard's focus is to make wines that pair well with food - dah! They serve up marvelous home made creations by their on-site chef, from their tasting room kitchen to prove it. They served chicken liver pate, apricot mustard, estate grown olives, roasted rosemary almonds, dilly beans, and a variety of local cheese. Oh, ok, we'll have a bite. Yep, they succeeded and now we're convinced that you can pair wine with food ;-) though I was tempted to tell them that I needed some more convincing. Seriously though, it was the nicest experience of the whole Napa trip. Had we only toured this one vineyard, we could have stopped thereafter and been perfectly happy.
With half a day left, we decided to drive west over the hills to Sonoma where we stopped for lunch at the Fremont Diner at the recommendation of the vineyard's chef. This was one cool roadside diner with some tractor stools at the counter, and a dozen picnic tables in a screened room adjacent to the ramshackle looking building. Watched the owner prepping his beef for smoking while we grazed on a ham biscuit, black & white shake and grilled cheese sandwich.
After lunch we parked at the Sonoma square and browsed the myriad of shops there before heading home on the back roads.
Enjoyed some chili and a dog at Gott's Roadside "Eat" at the Napa Oxbow Public Market before doing a laundromat run then heading back to the inn for the night.
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| Back roads in Sonoma |
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| Downtown Sonoma Square |
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| Gott's Roadside |
With half a day left, we decided to drive west over the hills to Sonoma where we stopped for lunch at the Fremont Diner at the recommendation of the vineyard's chef. This was one cool roadside diner with some tractor stools at the counter, and a dozen picnic tables in a screened room adjacent to the ramshackle looking building. Watched the owner prepping his beef for smoking while we grazed on a ham biscuit, black & white shake and grilled cheese sandwich.
After lunch we parked at the Sonoma square and browsed the myriad of shops there before heading home on the back roads.
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