After a few whirlwind work-related days in San Francisco, I was so excited to have a few days off.
My friend Jessica and I coordinated and extended our trip so that we could spend two more full days in SFO, and I am so thankful we did!
Being a huge fan of wine and never having stepped foot in wine country, I knew where I wanted to be at least one of the days we had available! Our friend Dyana joined us and helped coordinate our day in Sonoma, and it couldn’t have been more fabulous!
Now, if you’re wine tasting, the last thing that you want to have to do is designate a driver. So, we did what made most sense and hired a limo for the day! Yep!
Dyana had a 6pm flight, so the day trips via bus didn’t give us the flexibility we wanted. And, how better to travel in Sonoma than via limousine?? This also gave us the flexibility to choose where we wanted to go and to schedule our day. We went with Wine Country Limos, and we couldn’t have been more happy with our driver Abel. If you are planning this type of trip, I highly recommend him!
Ok… so, the limo came to pick us up at 9am. Remember me saying it was a late night on Wednesday? That 6 hours didn’t give me that much fuel for the day… but we’re talking wine country, so there was no time for sleepiness. We fueled up with Starbucks… and got on the road.
The trip to Sonoma took about an hour or so, which gave us ladies time to drink our coffee, catch up on the Alcatraz concert, and enjoy some bubbly!
The first stop was the every so beautiful Viansa Winery and Marketplace. I really think this was one of the most beautiful that we visited for the day. I’ll also note that the temperature was at least 20 degrees warmer in Sonoma than in the city… it actually felt like summer!
Next, we zoomed off to Jacuzzi, which was just moments away. Jacuzzi apparently had olive oil tasting as well, per the sign… but I only remember their wines, which were fantastic! The only bottle of wine we bought to take home came from Jacuzzi…
Right across the street from Jacuzzi was our favorite stop of the day: Cline Cellars.
While the actually property wasn’t as fabulous as some others we went to, the service FAR exceeded what we’d experienced thus far… and the wines were AMAZING (particularly both the white and red Cashmeres.) We seriously tried about 10 wines here, I feel. I don’t have the sheets from the party, but wow, there was a lot.
Note: This is also the time in the day where I got a little woozy. Wine tasting is seriously no joke. I needed food, and in a bad way. Thank goodness our friends at Cline had crackers, cheese, and lunchmeat handy in their market. I had to take a break and fuel up. Phew!
Fear not, my dears. After a quick snack, I was back in business in time to taste one of my favorite things of the day: The Dessert Wine. This is where it got CRAZY. Joe slid one of these to each of us, and told us to eat it before trying the next taster.
Yeah, it just looks like chocolate, but it wasn’t. It was milk chocolate with SEA SALT. HOLY HANNAH! Paired with the dessert wine, it tasted BEYOND AMAZING… better than that red velvet cake I’m always talking about. THAT GOOD.
After Cline, it was beyond lunch time… so we grabbed some quick sandwiches at a local sandwich place. And, we rallied for one more stop for bubbly.
I seriously had little room left for much more… but I powered through as we made our way to Gloria Ferrer Champagne Caves. It was a GORGEOUS place afterall.
And, that was all she wrote! We had to get Dyana back to the city for her flight home… Of course, we caught a few beautiful pics on the way back to the city. Note the traffic!
Have you ever been to Sonoma or Napa?
[…] After we got back from Sonoma, Jess and I checked into the Marriott Marquis that would be our home for the next 20-ish hours. LOVED this room. […]