California - Day 1

I’m taking a break from writing about New York City because I’m in California! My mom and I came to visit my brother for the weekend and it is SO beautiful and clean here (while we were driving today, my mom asked how anyone could ever want to live in New York over California. WAIT - I LIVE IN NEW YORK!).

Today was seriously so sunny and beautiful out (what a change from NYC) and we drove to Napa Valley to visit the wineries and walk around. The drive wasn’t too bad (around 1.5 hours?) and very beautiful:

The flowers are mustard flowers (I think) and there’s even a mustard festival going on soon. The first town we visited was Yountville, which had beautiful art galleries, cute shops, and little tea shops filled with pastries:

Initially, we were going to have lunch at a little restaurant called Mustard Grill that we read about online, but since the wait was so long, we decided to try our luck elsewhere. HOWEVER, we did get a funny picture by the front fountain:

We didn’t even have anything to drink yet!!

Since we couldn’t have lunch at Mustard Grill, we drove around and asked for recommendations and found a cute restaurant called Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen in St. Helena:

I had the hearty meatloaf with garlic mashed potatoes (which was AWESOME), my mom had the ahi tuna salad, and my brother had some kind of free range chicken with guacamole and veggies. My brother and I waiting for our food:

After lunch, we headed to our first wine tasting, which was the Beringer wineries. We tried six wines (three reds and three whites), which were good, but not great. My mom actually had a sip of one of the wines we were sampling and said that it tasted like one of the ingredients from the glue she used to make when she was a kid (I’m not quite sure why she was making glue as a kid, either). After Beringer Wineries, we headed to another winery down the road called V. Sattui. Their wines are ONLY sold in Napa and offer sampling as well - I really liked their Johannesberg Reisling and bought a bottle to take back to New York. A picture of the three of us sampling their Muscat wine (a dessert wine that was a little too sweet for us):

During the wine tasting, my mom somehow got a little tipsy and on our way to the next winery, look at the picture she took with me:

She ruined my picture!!!! (but in a funny way, so it’s okay)

The last winery we went to, The Robert Mondavi Winery, which was by far the most beautiful winery we visited (although, the Beringer Winery was amazing):

I can definitely imagine wedding in the winery area (actually, I’ve heard weddings in Napa Valley are really popular since it’s so beautiful and scenic there). AND, while walking around, we actually ran into a couple that got engaged! The winery is really a feast for the eyes - even though the trees were all really short and stubby, the area was still so beautiful and there was so much open space (and GRASS). A picture of me and my mom by the wine presses they used to use:

Finally, what blog entry would be complete without a funny picture from the day:

We left Napa around 6, got back to David’s area around 7:30 or so, went to a chinese restaurant my brother likes in Milpitas, and then headed back to David’s apartment. Tomorrow, we’re going to drive to the Hearst Castle (I think) and driving along Highway 1 (it’s supposed to be very scenic). I’m charging my camera battery tonight, so it’ll be ready for lots of pictures tomorrow!