I’ve returned from a much-needed getaway to Northern California. Although sadly, I still didn’t unplug completely from work, I still didn’t attend three full day’s worth of meetings either. And for the first time since I was 16, I wasn’t in San Francisco for some work purpose! It’s crazy to realize that all of the time that I’ve spent in the city over the last how-ever-many years was somehow tied to work.
We had an ungodly early flight from Austin to SF. And as usual, I did not sleep well the night before. I know I’m not the only one who stresses about sleeping through the alarm and missing my flight; but it sure is annoying to be the person in the household responsible for getting the other one up. It’s doubly added responsibility. I wake up every hour and a half in a panic, blindly grabbing for the clock to verify it’s still not time to get up. Once that alarm finally did go off, it was a mixture of relief (yay, the clock still works and I’m not late) and despair (oh dear god, please I just need another hour of sleep).
I had my usual window seat on the flight to SFO. I love watching the landscape unfold beneath me. It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve flown (and I’ve flown a lot), seeing the incredible scenery from 35,000 feet still takes my breath away. Fortunately, we had clear skies for the vast majority of the ride. Unfortunately, I was on the wrong side of the plane to see the Grand Canyon but the desert landforms and canyons on my side of the plane were a great consolation prize. And for someone who really hates cold weather, I still get oddly giddy about seeing mountains covered in snow. The closer we got to California, the more I expected the snow to disappear, based on the numerous times I’ve flown that same path during the drought years. But the Sierras were gloriously snowcapped almost all the way, which was a pleasant surprise after seeing them barren for so long. And the color of the hillsides and valleys were an electric green. I’ve never seen California land that lush before. I know they have had a ton of rain lately but it didn’t hit home until I saw the Superbloom for myself.
Landing in SFO, we grabbed our bags and jumped on the BART to ride the train into downtown. It was odd being back in the city. I practically lived there a few years ago, but hadn’t been back for at least 18 months. I had this weird sense of nostalgia walking the familiar streets… oh the Salesforce Tower is finally done… oh no, the cute little Italian restaurant where the waiters doted on me every time is gone… when did that building get refurbished, it looks amazing… oh thank goodness, my favorite watering hole is still here and it’s not as crazy crowded as it used to be.
Somehow, my hubby managed to sweet talk the hotel check-in woman into giving us the exact same room we had on a previous trip (which was a considerable upgrade apparently). The room has sweeping views of the San Francisco Bay, looking north and west – encompassing Alcatraz, Coit Tower, Sausalito, the Bay Bridge (but not the Golden Gate because of the angle of the room), and even the Transamerica Pyramid building. I sat on the couch and gazed out the window for hours when we weren’t roaming the streets. San Francisco and the area around the Bay are some of the most beautiful urban environs in the United States, IMHO. And we had spectacular weather, sunny and clear, in which to view the scenery from the 39th floor room we were staying in.
The first day, we wandered (and I was able to get my hubby to avoid any of the major hills, it pays to know the streets as well as I do). We ate and then visited a handful of my favorite drinking establishments before calling it a night. The second day, we discovered that they still aren’t anywhere close to finishing the years-long construction project at Union Square. After watching my hubby shop for hours (seriously, he is the shopper in the family), we had to go back to the hotel to drop off all of his newly acquired stuff. We set out again, this time towards the Embarcadero, stopping for drinks and appetizers as we roamed. At a whisky bar, we asked where we should go next and to our surprise, the bartender told us we should head to the Mission District instead. So we jumped into a Lyft to see what kind of mischief we could get up to. While there were a smattering of fun places we went into, I realized that we’re really spoiled living in Austin, only a block away from booze-soaked and wall-to-wall bars on Dirty Sixth.
The next day, we picked up our rental car to start the second phase of our trip. The hubster rented a Cadillac XTS. (My father worked his entire life at Ford and while it sounds almost blasphemous to say this, I could totally see buying one. It was a really nice ride.) Thank goodness we had a comfy car. The drive up to Napa took seemingly forever. I have no idea where the hell everyone in the Bay Area was going on Sunday, but I guess they all had to take I-80.
We drove straight to one of our favorite wineries to get there before they closed for the day. But they told us the club room was full and they couldn’t just put us in the regular tasting room and give us the good stuff. Which is a shame because I really like their wines; but now the hubby is like, well why do we spend thousands of dollars on their wines then if we can’t even get the stated benefit we’re supposed to get from being in their highest level club? (And because we end up basically joining the wine club for every winery we go to, we end up having to do a pruning exercise at least once a year. Guess who’s on the cut list after this trip?)
Spurned, we went to Chateau Montelena (pretty grounds, decent wines although nothing blew my socks off) and on our way to finally check into the hotel, pulled into Alpha Omega’s tasting room purely because they were open late. That was the best spur-of-the-moment of the entire trip. I love big, bold cabernets and this place had them in spades. Every sample I had, I involuntarily said “whoa” after the first sip. I somehow ended up chatting with a gentleman who apparently is very well connected in the Valley. He was drinking stuff that wasn’t even bottled yet. He was kind enough to share with me and let’s just say that we’ve added another wine club to the rotation to make up for the one we dropped.
A bit of advice for those of you who haven’t been to Napa… know that Mondays are apparently the new Fridays. A week out, I figured that we wouldn’t have a problem trying to make reservations at tasting rooms for Monday. Well, it’s damn near impossible. And because a lot of the higher end (and even a lot of the middling) wineries now require reservations for tastings, it means you can’t be spontaneous. And you know that hurts my heart because the best moments in my trips are usually the unscripted ones (i.e. the spur-of-the-moment Alpha Omega tasting). Fortunately, three of our favorites made space for us on Monday (naturally we joined the wine clubs for the two we didn’t already belong to; the other is a winery that we spend way too much money with and they treated us like treasured family members so I still get to drink Georges de LaTour Reserve to my heart’s content).
The next day, I had scheduled tastings at three reservation-only wineries in celebration of the hubby’s birthday. On a previous trip to Napa, we stumbled into Duckhorn and had a fantastic experience. This time, I made a reservation for their estate tasting. We were incredibly fortunate to have Olivia as our educator. Once she found out we were celebrating a birthday, she went the extra pour to make sure we had a great time. We ended up running late for our second appointment, this time at Joseph Phelps. Sadly, they did not have Bacchus on the tasting menu this time around. We had to slum it with Insignia 😉 And then we finally got to our third tasting at Nickel and Nickel where they served eight (!) different and amazingly delicious wines. I have no idea how many cases we ended up buying there but they waived the (very) expensive tasting fees so I’m pretty sure I don’t want to check the AMEX statement anytime soon.
I’m not gonna lie, three tastings like that in one day will accomplish a few things: one, you’re drinking amazing stuff so you quickly become jaded by stuff that you would normally swoon over; two, if you have a propensity to join wine clubs, the expensive tasting fees could be waived thereby sort of saving you money because you spend a bunch more in return; and three, depending on the winery, you get generous pours in those types of tastings and you could get very drunk by the end of the day, particularly if you’re finishing up the wine the driver is not consuming.
To top it off, we went to dinner at a fantastic place in Napa, Cole’s Chop House, and had even more wine. My polyphenol levels have to be off the charts by now, which you know, I need to keep me healthy ;).
Sadly, we had to return to real life and work to pay for all of the wine that is probably making its way to my condo as I type. It was a great little getaway. Is it tempting fate to say that I could see making this an annual thing? It’s exciting and gratifying to be making long-term plans for the future like that because as one point, I wasn’t sure that I would have the ability to make those kinds of plans.