Nipping the bottle in Napa

Trip Start Aug 26, 2007
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Trip End Sep 11, 2007


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Flag of United States  , California,
Friday, September 7, 2007

Our last day in Wine Country - we will explore the Napa Valley today.  We have a few wineries in mind - but other than that - we will see what looks good.  First on our list is to stop at Andretti.  Mario Andretti was a newcomer to the wine business in the late 90's.  We had met him a few times at racing events and also met him once while he was in Michigan promoting his (then) new wines.  A very beautiful estate in Napa Valley.  We enjoyed seeing it very much.  A real newcomer was next.  Black Stallion - the old riding club in Napa Valley - they had an actual ¼ mile track inside one of the buildings for example - but now it is a beautiful winery surrounded by vineyards.  The Tasting Room Manager had just returned from 9 days in Costa Rica - so he was excited to relive his trip with us.  We really enjoyed their wines.  Chimney Rock - was another one that we stopped by.  By now we are realizing that yesterday in Sonoma we had a great deal going.  There was a promotion and all but one of the wineries that we stopped at had a promotion with Visa Signature - if you had a Visa Signature credit card then the wine tasting was free.  Typically the charge is from $5 - $15.00 per tasting - so that can add up fast - especially if it is x2.  That promotion was only going on in Sonoma and Napa Valley wineries didn't have such a great promotion - but since I had a bit further to drive today - Jim sampled the tastings and I just took a small sip from each one.  Typically 5 different wines  per winery - but we seemed to always get a 6th one poured for us.  Maybe all of the Costa Rican connections - everyone wanted us to try 'just one more'.  We finished up near St. Helena and then drove back down and had dinner in Napa - then it was back to our room for the night.  Tomorrow we head out, hopefully relatively early, to Modesto to Bart and Hazel's.  The big party is tonight - we can't wait.
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Comments

5025
5025 on Sep 8, 2007 at 05:40PM

Napa
Wonderful pictures!

Mom

tmctagg
tmctagg on Sep 10, 2007 at 06:02PM

Vino
Boy those pictures bring back a lot of memories. St Francis is a great place. We were able to get into the reserve room the last time and they had food pairings for us to taste. It was amazing as well as wonderful.

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