HAPPY 26th BIRTHDAY, CONOR!
Another early start to the day!
Rosie and I feel a tad guilty this morning… we’re dropping
Conor off way too early at San Francisco airport for his return flight to Los Angeles
so that we can, selfishly, continue our holiday without him, driving up to
Calistoga to make a picnic and wine tasting at Chateau Montelena (CM), 1429
Tubbs Ln, where I’m a ‘cellar master’ and made even more famous in the movie
‘Bottle Shock’.
We were all up early and mostly packed by the time we
departed the hotel for breakfast by 0730.
Yesterday, as we strolled back up to our hotel from the America’s Cup
venues and wharfs, we spied an interesting looking place to possibly have
breakfast very close to the hotel. So we
decided that’s where we’d go for breakfast at, Hollywood Grill/Café, 530 N.
Point St. We got there around 0740 and
there was already a line building up to get in and be seated either inside or
outside at the handful of tables they had set out. We waited for inside seating just because it
was a bit nippy outside, beautiful day but brisk. While we waited we could see how everything
was prepared and were impressed by the serving sizes, rapidity of service and,
the mounds of fresh fruit that was part of most breakfasts. Didn’t have to wait long and were seated
inside within 10mins of arrival.
The Hollywood Café’s menu was very celebrity themed. Before you can place your orders, a waitress
comes over and deposits a huge plate of sliced and toasted sour dough bread at
your table that everyone shares – there was more there than we could all
eat. Rosie and Conor ended up getting
the same thing: a James Dean… basically
2 eggs, bacon and a large bowl of fruit.
I went with a western omelet, corned beef hash and their famous hash
browns. All good.
By the time we polished off breakfast and walked back to our
hotel, finished packing, checked out and loaded the SUV, it was about 0900 and
we were on the 101 south towards the airport… a mere 12miles away. Conor’s flight was scheduled to leave at
around 1400 so, dropping him off at 0945 for our own selfish reasons continued
to bother us – for a bit. J He got back home in plenty of time to go out
with friends later that evening to celebrate his birthday more locally.
We departed the airport and headed back up north on the 101
towards the city. Along the way we
discussed and decided to take an alternate route up to Calistoga via I-80 and
over the San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge,
we’d already done the over Golden Gate Bridge – Hwy 101 route. Rosie had never been that way and the last
time I ever crossed over the older, pre-earthquake version of the bridge was
back during my test pilot days. So,
instead of continuing north on the 101, we exited right onto I-80 just before
entering San Francisco proper and had a beautiful drive over the new bridge
spans. Rosie will now be able to say
that she drove over Yerba Buena Island (mid-span of the bridge) and see
man-made Treasure Island, which is located just left or north of YB Island. Treasure Island was completed and opened in
1939 and has a colorful and varied history of occupation/function from the US Navy,
to Hollywood for film making and, most recently, for residential homes.
The bridge takes you over to Oakland and the Alameda area
which is another area heavy in prior military use and history. I recall continuing eastward for quite some
time before heading north towards the Napa Valley area, eventually intercepting
I-80 again funneling us up through Vallejo.
We were basically navigating via a paper map of Northern California
since we didn’t have our GPS with us and were really missing the ‘comfort’ of
having a GPS to rely on. We were in need
of a new GPS because Meghan and Mike had our old one in hand for their vacation
coming up through the Southwest starting in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
As we started northwards on I-80, we spied a Target off to
our right and quickly got off I-80 at exit 33. Made our way to the store and eventually found
and purchased a new Garmin Nuvi with large display that would be extremely
useful over the next week as we made our way north. The exit we had taken just happened to put us
on to state Hwy 37 west which intercepted Hwy 29, the roadway that meanders it
way north westerly, all the way up through Napa Valley and eventually to
Calistoga, our destination for this Sunday.
This will be only the 2nd time Rosie and I have
made the trip up through Napa Valley to Calistoga. The last time was with Conor and it was a
very quick ½ day onsite in downtown Calistoga and at Chateau Montelena for a
private wine tasting – definitely not enough time to really enjoy the occasion. As you drive up through the valley, unless
you plan on visiting the city, Napa is just a pass through. All along Rt29 there are vineyards, some notably
famous others, not so much but, there are many of them. An interesting man-made feature that
parallels the highway is railroad tracks.
Not sure what they were originally for but, today, the train that runs
up and back on the tracks is used to take enthusiastic wine tasters for hassle
free taste testing throughout the valley.
Not exactly sure where or how many stops but might be a fun thing to do
on some other visit.
As we did last time, we stopped in lovely St. Helena… a
small town about 20miles north of Napa and 10miles south of Calistoga. Enjoyed a nice stroll along main street and
some shopping in a couple of stores (I purchased two more ‘Old Men Rule’, John
Wayne t-shirts) before we jumped back in to our SUV and continued on to
Calistoga. We really wanted to get up
there as soon as we could to maximize the remainder of the day and evening
between the town and Chateau Montelena.
Arrived in Calistoga at right around 1300, and took a right
onto Lincoln Street, still Hwy 29, and drove through town and over to the
Comfort Inn hotel about ½ a mile out of town where we had a room for the
night. We were too early and our room
wasn’t ready. No worries, just dropped
off our luggage and headed over to Tubbs Lane, conveniently just ~1mile north
on Hwy29, took a left on Tubbs and drove the short 1/4mile to the entrance of
Chateau Montelena on the right and drove up the driveway to preferred Cellar
Masters parking right by the entrance to the Chateau and wine tasting area.
Got out of the SUV and made our way to the ladies greeting
folks at the door. Introduced ourselves…
they had been expecting us and let us know that Jade Island was cordoned off and
set up just for us on this afternoon. We
didn’t have a lot of time between enjoying the picnic I had in mind for us and
when our wine tasting started at 1500.
We quickly made our way down to Jade Lake and Jade Island with the
lovely gazebo on it to check things out, only to discover that there was no
food or drinks set out for us – I had assumed poorly and had never asked the
question! So, with our time counting
down, we ran back up to our SUV and drove back to downtown Calistoga, found the
1 grocery store, CalMart, off main street and bought a lot of picnic food to
take back to Chateau Montelena for our picnic:
cheeses, breads, fruits, meats and a couple of pre-made sandwiches. More food than we could or would eat but,
we’d have leftovers for a picnic somewhere along the way the next day.
By the time we got back to the vineyard it was just after
1400. While Rosie took our picnic down
to Jade Island, I went into the wine tasting area, bought a lovely liter of
chilled CM Chardonnay, bogarted a very nice wine bottle opener and, hurried
back down to join Rosie for our picnic.
We only had about 45mins to enjoy the outdoors and our picnic before
needing to head back up to the Chateau for our private wine tasting.
Our time on Jade Island was terrific, albeit it too short in
duration. It was technically all ours
for the afternoon and other visitors were prevented from intruding on our
intimate picnic with signage and a gate.
All of our food was excellent, the Chardonnay was flowing, we took a ton
of photos and polished off the entire bottle before it was time for us to run
back up to make our private tasting…
needless to say, we were feeling quite toasty by the time we got back up
into the Grand Room of the private residence!
Our hostess for the wine tasting and afternoon was,
Tina. She hadn’t been with the winery
for long but, she was well versed in its history and on the estate cabernets we
would taste this afternoon. We were
joined by a family of 4, the Shirai’s, from the San Francisco area and I/we
quickly struck up conversation, primarily due to the fact that they definitely
looked of Japanese ancestry – they were but interesting enough, none of them
spoke any Japanese. They were definitely
all Japanese Americans. The younger
couple, Ted and Sandy, was our age. Ted
was a dentist. Sandy’s parents, Milt and
Millie, Milt was a retired doctor, were also very nice and they were as
interested in Rosie and I as we were of them.
We kept talking amongst ourselves so much that we frequently interrupted
Tina’s hosting! A very nice family
indeed and we would enjoy their company for the entire afternoon.
The wine tasting was going great and just when we all thought
it was coming to an end Tina surprised us by letting us know that, if we were
up for it, she would take us out in the 8 person golf cart for a tour of the
vineyard! What an awesome thing to
do! We were all quite excited and
enthused while we headed out to the golf cart.
Tina gave us a wonderful drive around, stopping at several locations so
that we could get out, taste the grapes (zinfandel and old+new cabernet sauvignon)
on the vines and, take pictures. We
really enjoyed it… what a very excellent surprise! Before we knew it we were back at the Chateau to
finish up the afternoon with a dessert wine, exchange e-mails with our new
friends bid them goodbye and, confirmed our Cellar Master orders for the coming
year – I changed nothing. Before we left
we bought a few mementoes. By the time
we departed back to the hotel, we were quite happy, the time was ~1630 and we
were feeling no pain.
Our room was ready when we got back to the hotel. We had intended to quickly unload the SUV and
drop everything off in the room before heading back out to enjoy downtown
Calistoga… however, once we got into the room and closed the door we both
decided just to lay down for a few minutes before heading out. With all the curtains open in our 1st
floor room, we fell asleep on the bed!
The next thing we know, its 2015 and we could have easily just stayed in
bed. I made myself get up and drove back
into town to purchase beverages and dinner for us. Fortunately, the CalMart didn’t close until
2100 and I had 15min to make my purchases – plenty of time.
Got back to the hotel just after 2100. I really felt bad that we’d missed the
opportunity, once again this time around, to enjoy Calistoga but, we really
needed the nap! Convinced Rosie to
change into our swimwear and we made the short stroll over to the completely
unoccupied pool, hot whirlpool and, steam sauna. We ended up spending over an hour enjoying
the whirlpool and pool under a clear, moon filled sky. And, just for me, time in the steam
sauna. We loved it! Back in our room by 2200, did some route
planning for the next day and blogged some before we hit the rack.
What a terrific event filled day for us that started out in
San Francisco enjoying breakfast with Conor on his 26th
birthday! Plenty more ‘never done
that/been there’ days to go!
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