Falling (Jumping?) off the Wagon...

After a few days holed up in Silicon Valley working, we headed to San Francisco airport to pick up friends, Ted and Vic, and drive to Sonoma and Napa Valley.

Although California has been suffering one of its worst droughts in history, wine country has not been heavily affected.  The biggest adjustment they have had to make is harvesting the wine earlier in the Fall as the dry and hot conditions ripens the fruit faster. Surprisingly, the harsher conditions actually make the vines work harder and produce better grapes, albeit in smaller quantities.

Although we have mostly given up drinking while travelling (a small attempt to live healthier while on the move), we naturally abandoned this regime while in California and spent the week visiting multiple wineries in both Sonoma and Napa and enjoying wine tastings to the fullest.

Between the tastings, the four of us went swimming, played tennis, worked out, ate at fantastic restaurants like Glen Ellen Starr, debated the issues of the day and played an incredible amount of euchre, a new card game for the two of us.  Perhaps our most unexpectedly enjoyable experience was the Sonoma cab drivers - one of whom successfully played the dual role of taxi driver and taxi dispatcher on a very busy Saturday and another who took on the dual role of tour guide and dj/singer as he encouraged us to participate as he bopped along to the old classic,  Patta Patta.

Although we managed to lock our keys in the car one day, forget a pair of shoes at one of our stops and have our credit card illegally copied at Trader Joe's, "jumping" off the wagon with Ted and Vic was a most delicious experience!