Napa 2015

Turns out, we've spent a lot of hours and minutes in the air this year. Between my job, which sends me to California about once a month, and just a lot of travel opportunities, we were on the go much of 2015.

So, when I realized my company's user conference was in downtown San Francisco in early November, I thought -- why not tack on a quick trip to Napa?!  Chris and I were both a little hesitant because we HAD done a ton of travel this year.  But, we also know that opportunities to get away don't always present themselves and other than our own hesitation, there wasn't a glaring reason why we shouldn't go. A few phone calls to grandparents and we were booked!

What made the trip even better is we got to buddy up with two of our couple friends. Our friends Jason and Brandi (Jason also works at Guidewire, so he liked my logic) and Stori and Richard joined us for fun.

Chris met me in San Fran on Wed evening. We hung out with my work colleagues, then got up early Thursday morning and hopped in our Camaro convertible (WHAT?).  Hey, traveling a lot allows for accumulation of travel points!



We ate lunch at Gott's Roadside for a greasy and delicious hamburger (even for a Texas girl!)  Then we drove towards Calistoga where we had an amazing private tasting of the Spire Collection. Then we drove up Spring Mountain and had a great tasting with some gorgeous mountain scenery at Pride Wines.  We ended the evening in St. Helena at a lovely restaurant (aren't they all amazing??) called LMR Farmstead.  We stayed in a lovely little cottage like hotel called Villagio

Our super fun group! (It was a little bright out)
The girls :) Love them both!
From the Spire Collection tasting room. Grapes for days!

Sunset on Spring Mountain at Pride Wines

Seriously - you can't make this scenery up!

The next day was a full day. But not before Chris got a little work done. The day before he got a call from his agent that he was selected to be the voice for Indian Motorcycles.  The catch - they needed it recorded the next day! So a mobile recording unit came to our hotel room and Chris recorded while I got ready (quietly) in the bathroom.

We hired a driver since we wanted to squish as many wineries in as we possibly could. While a bit pricey (we got stuck in a 2-hour back up which made the price tag extra steep), it was totally worth it. Another great tip (that was passed along from Stori) was to have our conceirge set up the tastings.  Turns out, we got a free or discounted tasting at all these places.  We hit up:

Darioush was the epitome of opulence, but still amazingly gorgeous

There was a slight mix up with our tasting reservation so we got a tour of the Darious property. Simply gorgeous. 

At Alpha and Omega, we through a bunch of money at our driver and he got us sandwiches from Dean and Deluca (my fave!). This day was beyond perfect. I'm not sure the sky could have been bluer.


I wish we would have captured the tasting room at Hall Wines. It's floor too ceiling glass windows with no panes.  This picture makes me happy :)


We ended this night with dinner in Yountville (where we were staying) at Hurley's.  After drinking all day, we didn't have much left in us, so walked our full bellies back to our room.

On Saturday, it was just Chris and I.  We decided to make a quick stop into Sonoma before heading back to the airport. Lucky for us, one of the Hall Wines (Walt Wines) has a tasting room in Sonoma, so we got to enjoy some of that.


We spotted the shipping carts and absolutely wanted one. They give you anything if you join the wine club! :)
It was a very quick trip, but just the right amount of time to taste a bunch of wine, eat a ton of great food, and spend some time with great friends. We highly recommend taking friends to Napa. It's great to compare wines with other people, but most importantly, when you're a little buzzed at the end of the day, you have someone to share it with!