Wine Country (A-G-A-I-N)

Its a hard life, but someone's gotta do it.   I mean really, its hard. Just look how hard it is!  My bi-monthly champagne order from Domaine Carneros and because we wanted to kick the long weekend off with some bubbly.  And because I'm a club member, we got to sit on the private terrace.  I'd suggest you make a reservation because this place gets PACKED. Its pretty much the first stop on the path to Napa.

Annnndddd got a F-R-E-E tasting! You can't beat that! And Laura, our server, was amazing!  She may or may not know the B Man's uncle who has been coming for the past 5 years or so.

I brought the B man along, mostly because he drove us. And he's pretty cute.  It was a lovely sunny day on the patio.  We soaked up the sun and bubbles and decided to make a second stop while we were in Napa.

Next up was Domaine Chandon!  I mean, you can't top Domaine Carneros, but Chandon was pretty good. We didn't do a tour, but we did do a tasting. I did the Rose tasting and the B Man did the classic. We didn't make a reservation, we just walked in, we just walked in, enjoyed the champagne and took in the great views.

Mmmm....

I'll take the bottle please!

 You could take a bottle outside and sit in the sunny grass.

And on the way home I always get so excited to see the city emerge and take in the breathtaking sites of the city!

Just LOOK at that skyline!

It never gets old....

Bachlorette Partaaaayyyy x2

As a continuation of our adventures that I posted on Friday, we continued the bachlorette party in Charlottesville, VA. Next up was Bold Rock Cidery....I've never been to a cidery before!  To be honest, we probably had had a bit of alcohol by now so this wasn't the clearest....and I don't particularly love cider, but it was F-U-N!

This is what was on tap that day

Emily and I cheersing to the day!

Pretty cool, you get to watch them fill the glass bottles from the sampling room!

And out comes the bottle with cider in it!

I also learned a little bit about cider from their FAQ site:

Am I the only one, or do other people get confused about the definitions of hard cider, sweet cider, apple juice and cider? 

No, it is confusing!  In colonial America, people referred to the alcoholic beverage made from fermented apples as just “cider” and most other countries still say "cider" when they are referring to the fermented alcoholic beverage.  However, in an attempt to get Americans to decrease consumption of alcohol around Prohibition years, the term “cider” began to be used to refer to unprocessed apple juice, which doesn’t have alcohol to start, but which can ferment given time.  The confusion has been there ever since, but here are some definitions that should help:

• Hard Cider is apple juice that has gone through a fermentation process in which its sugars have turned into alcohol.  Just as wine is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grape juice, hard cider is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented apple juice.

• Sweet Cider is apple juice that has not been processed, stabilized, or filtered, often leaving it cloudy and brownish.  Although it does not have alcohol in it initially, since it is not pasteurized or processed, it could begin to ferment in time.

• Apple Juice is the liquid (juice) pressed from apples.  Most apple juice found in stores has been filtered and pasteurized.

• Cider can refer to either hard cider or sweet cider in the U. S. because there is no standard definition for all states.  Other countries tend to use the term “cider” for the alcoholic beverage and “apple juice” for the non-alcoholic beverage and not use the terms “hard cider” or “sweet cider” at all.

So there you go!

And of course we had to stop to take a group photo!

Next up it was time to go home and THANKFULLY we all got to take a nap!  You can't get a group of 30 year old girls together for an all day drunk fest and expect us to rage on through the night. One by one we all made our way to our beds for a quick (ok...2 hour) cat nap.

We all got our glow sticks on and donned our black dresses to head out for a night of fun!  First up was Commonwealth Skybar.

I mean, how fun are all of these glow sticks?!?!?!

Next up was to Escafe!  This place was so much fun! Who knew that under black light, gin & tonics turn this color?!?!

PHOTOBOMB by Jess!

Locations
Bold Rock Cidery
1020 Rockfish Valley Hwy, Nellysford, VA 22958

Commonwealth Skybar
422 E Main St, Charlottesville, VA 22902

Escafe
215 Water St W, Charlottesville, VA 22902

Bachlorette Partaaaayyyy

We continued the weekend off with visiting several wineries in Charlottesville!  We had a full day of wineries, breweries and cideries...just the way I like it!  We had a chauffeur that drove us from place to place.

First stop was King Family Vineyard, such a cute little place!  The outside was BEAUTIFUL!!! 

But first, let's take a selfie! Me, Erika and Melissa.  If I could only count just how many selfies we had over the last 9 years....

MMMM getting the day started off right! Their rose was ON POINT!

Next stop was Veritas Vineyard & Winery.  We got to take a winery tour!

Where they separate and crush the grapes

This is where they ferment the grapes into wine

They re-use the barrels for several years.

Grapes under the overhang

Panomramic picture of us sampling the wine!

Here's a better picture of us all!

After all of that drinking, we were thankful to make a stop at Devil's Backbone Brewery for lunch!  I love that Erika loves beer as much as I do!  We sampled several of their beers while shoveling food in our mouth!

 

And the group photos continue...stay tuned for more bachlorette shennanigans....

Locations
King Family Vineyard
6550 Roseland Farm, Crozet, VA 22932

Veritas Vineyard & Winery
151 Veritas Lane, Afton Virginia 22920

Devil's Backbone Brewery
200 Mosbys Run, Roseland, VA 22967 

The Winery

After exploring the Treasure Island flea market, Brad and I walked over to The Winery (yes, that is its name THE Winery).  It was set in an old airplane hangar and was really a beautiful site, as you can see below.

This would be a beautiful place to have a wedding reception, cool to be amidst the wine barrels and strands of hanging lights.

Um, why WOULDN'T you do the both series and add Glitter Sparkling Wine for only $21?!?!?!  Um... DUH that's what we did.  You get 9 tastings for $21...not a bad deal. 

We thought it was a great deal until we started tasting them.....MAN, I really wanted to LOVE this place but most just not my taste (or Brad's). There were plenty of people there enjoying their time and their wine.

But we still enjoyed spending time together gossiping and sipping on the wine.  I really liked how the space was laid out and the touches that it had connecting to the space, such as these fun explanations of local landmarks. You can see the Bay Bridge right outside of the building (not in this picture but in real life).

It really is truly a beautiful space! 

Hannah's Visit! Friday Recap.

I was so excited that Hannah was coming to visit!

Hannah arrived on Thursday evening and we headed out to get dinner, well once she finally got here.  For some reason traffic was a nightmare and took her 2 hours to get from the airport. That trip normally takes 20 minutes, 30 minutes max. Maybe it was graduation, maybe it was residual traffic from the earlier Giants game, or maybe it was just a stroke of bad luck.

We worked from home on Friday, I love that both of us work from home and can do as we please.  I suggested that we go to happy hour at Prospect, which is only about 2 blocks from my house. They have some phenomenal cocktails on happy hour that are seasonal.  We both had 2 cocktails, one was a Springtime Rickey (Gin, Strawberry, Mint, Lime, Soda Water) and one was a Good Start (Vodka, Grapefruit, Lemon, Orange, Mint ).  It felt like old times when we used to pretend we were grown-ups. Turns out, we’re still pretending!!! 

A Srpingtime Rickey

From there, I suggested we head to Jax winery. I’ve been wanting to go there for quite some time, but they’re only open for a couple of hours on Wed, Thur and Friday evenings.  I walk past it longingly when I do pass by and it’s open because the atmosphere is just so quaint.  They have little fire pits and some greenery.

We headed there and stumbled upon a gold mine. The wine was just SO FREAKING GOOD.   

Barrels of wine!

It was super chilly that day, so we hung out under the heated lamps. Nothing like experiencing winter in May.  We drank wine and gossiped the evening away. 

They are dog friendly too!

 

We may have had about a bottle a piece as we chit chatted the evening away. Apparently nothing changes when we get together because the evening quickly got away from us and we were stumbling home and had a fantastic evening!

Another Day in Wine Country

Man, my life is pretty charmed. I mean, I may only have a handful of friends here in San Francisco, but I make the best of it!

Since I became a Wine Club Member at Domaine Carneros, it was time for me to go and pick up my wine shipment! You just can't beat 'having to go' to here to pick up my wine...darn!  #firstworldproblems!  What I didn't know was that you pretty much get hooked up by being in the club!

You get to sit on the special patio!

And turns out you get a free tasting! I went for the red wine taster (well...the real tasting has 4 tastes but you only get 3 tastings in the free one...darn).

And Brad went for the champagne taster!

THIS IS THE LIFE!

After spending about 2 hours there soaking up the sun, drinking our bubbly, and eating the charcuterie plate, we decided to pick up my bubble and head to the next place!  

Our next stop was at Kunde Winery.  Man, this place was BEAUTIFUL!!!  There's so many different outside areas where you can grab a bottle and sit outside or bring your own picnic and sit on the ground.

Unfortunately we got there and then found out they were closing in 5 minutes for a private event...darn!!!!  So they gave us a free tasting as a condolence prize.  I had the white and Brad had the red.  It was definitely yummy!

I was sad we only spent 5 minutes there, I definitely want to go back sometime!  They had the whole place decorated for Fall and Pumpkins...too bad its like almost 90 degrees in Napa! Definitely not Fall-like!

ALL the pumpkins!!

And our 3rd and final stop was to Imagery Winery. They were also closing soon...(next time we aren't  going to make a reservation at Domaine so late!) but not for 45 minutes. We sweet talked the winery guy into letting us purchase a bottle so we could sit outside and eat our sandwiches from this AMAZING yummy random sandwich shop along the side of the road called Carneros Deli.  If you are in the area, you MUST stop here!

We had a really quick tasting of 4 red wines and decided to go with an AMAZING Barbera wine....let me tell you, this was fantastic!!!  A bit pricey for $40, but it was so good! It was a very light and crisp red wine that just went down so smoothly!

We sat outside on their large patio and drank our bottle and ate our sandwiches before heading home. This place is so cute and has a boccee court (you did't know you were reading a 2013 Arlington Bocce Ball champion's blog, did you?!?!) I love that this place was so laid back and I could see having a great big group out back, just drinking bottles on bottles on bottles :)

Ahhh....its just another beautiful day in California!