Just over the hill from Napa Valley is another wine country, but no, it’s not Sonoma Valley it’s the Suisun Valley wine country. This little known appellation has been producing quality grapes for decades although it quite literally has been in the shadow of Napa.
Located right off of Interstate 80 near Fairfield, the appellation offers [...]
Entries Tagged as ‘Wanderlust’
January 12, 2010
Tasting in the valley next door
November 26, 2009
Hidden Napa Valley back country
The mountains and vineyards of Napa Valley are some of the area’s best known scenic beauty, but if you know where to look you can find gems of more wild scenery.
One spot is tucked away in the far corner of a small valley carved through the mountains by Redwood Creek. A couple of buddies and [...]
September 20, 2009
Prost!
There’s a great photo essay on Slate depicting German beer festivals, especially the Bavarian Oktoberfest in Munich. You may think Octoberfest takes place next month, but the traditional German celebration begins in September and runs into the first week of October. It began in Munich yesterday and I’m sure it was quite a party today [...]
July 31, 2009
Stumptown and Hippie City, Part 3
After days of feasting and wine tasting, our souls needed replenishing. On our second day in Eugene, or Hippie City as I like to call it, we decided to head into the majestic Cascade Mountains east of Eugene to pristine Waldo Lake. I had read that this is one of the cleanest lakes in the [...]
July 30, 2009
Stumptown and Hippie City, Part 2
On our second day in Portland we met up with some friends for lunch in the suburb of Hillsboro and reminisced about our days when all of us lived out on the coast in Astoria. Hillsboro is located near the northern edge of the Willamette Valley wine country so after lunch Christine and I decided [...]
July 29, 2009
Stumptown and Hippie City, Part 1
The team was in Oregon for a couple of days as part of a quick trip through my old stomping grounds in the Beaver State. We had hoped to get a respite from the heat of a California summer but instead found ourselves in the midst of an Oregon heat wave.
After settling in at our [...]
July 7, 2009
Golf and Snowshoe
As I drove up into the Sierra Nevada foothills on Highway 4, passing logging trucks left a perfume of fresh cut wood as they roared by me in the opposite lane.
I had the day off from work in light of the recent Fourth of July holiday and was looking to enjoy some mountain air and [...]
June 30, 2009
A sparkling flight
Sometimes you just don’t appreciate a place because you see it damn near every day. Growing up in Sonoma but having close ties in Napa I would drive by the Domaine Carneros winery on an almost daily basis. I watched it get built when I was a small child and I noticed every little change [...]
June 25, 2009
Bear River
The return of warm weather with the start of summer reminded me of one of the best little day trips me and the team took last summer. We drove up to Bear River reservoir in the foothills off Highway 88 in the El Dorado National Forest.
A colleague of mine had tipped me to the lake, [...]
June 16, 2009
Wine tasting by bicycle
With the last of Lodi’s wonderful spring weather upon us this past weekend (it’s expected to be 96 by Friday), Christine and I decided we needed to do something outside. We hopped on our Electra cruiser bikes and pedaled over to Lodi Lake to check out the boat rentals. Our plan was to rent a [...]
