Sonoma Valley - Wine Region

Scott and I set the alarm at 7am this morning. We both got up and had yoghurt for breakfast and packed our bags. We headed to Thrifty the car rental place near the airport where we were hiring our car for the next part of the trip. We arrived at 9am and it was a seamless process collecting our car. By 9:30am we were on the road headed for Sonoma Valley for some wine tasting.

I drove first as Scott was a bit nervous about driving on the opposite side of the road. We headed onto the freeway and through San Francisco before heading over the Golden Gate Bridge. I was hoping it wouldn’t be foggy so we could grab some more photos but there was thick fog covering the bridge. We drove over and headed towards Sonoma Valley. Scott had googled a few wineries that didn’t require reservations so we headed towards Viansa winery. We arrived around 11:30am and walked in.

We were advised we could complete a tasting from the bar and sit anywhere outside that didn’t have reserved on the table. We collected our first tasting and relaxed in the courtyard overlooking the vineyards and valley. All the tables were reserved on the courtyard so we were quite lucky to grab the last one. We sat there for over an hour enjoying the view and our tastings and we also bought a bowl of green olives which were delicious. Scott asked one of the servers if they had any recommendations for other wineries and they mentioned Klunde winery was their sister winery and also allowed walk ins.

We had brought lunch with us so we made some sandwiches and ate them as we drove to the next winery. The next winery was in the valley and had beautiful views overlooking the vineyards. We sat down and asked for the wine tastings, which included 6 different wines. We relaxed and tried the 6 wines before relaxing on some arm chairs in front of a fountain.

Scott had found a few other wineries and we thought we could squeeze one more in before most closed at 5pm. We drove to Little Vineyards, which was a small family run winery. The family had moved in 1996 and planted 17.5 acres of vineyards, before starting to make wine in 2002. We tried 4 tastings all red and we were also given a rose to start the tasting off with. Scott and I really enjoyed the wines. The Sonoma Valley is known for producing red wines, especially Zinfandel, Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon.

We started talking to the couple on the table next to us and they said the valley usually fills with fog in the morning from San Francisco. We were surprised the fog would travel so far. They also mentioned that if we were heading to Muir Woods in the morning it would also be covered in fog. They gave us some suggestions, before we headed back to Santa Rosa.

Scott and I were both exhausted from the early days so we decided to grab a salad for dinner and relaxed at the hotel, before having an early night.Baca lagi