Wine Country - Stag's Leap Wine Cellars

Life turns on a dime. Warren Winiarski, a college professor in the US, bought a 50 acre plot of ranch in Napa in 1970 and turned that into a vineyard. A bottle of his very first vintage (1973) won the now famous 1976 Judgement of Paris against some of the most prestigious red wines from Bordeaux including Chateau Mouton-Rothschild and Chateau Haut Brion. The competition was organized by a British wine merchant, Steven Spurrier, who wasn't selling any Californian wines and didn't think Californian wines would win. Mr Winiarski kept the winery running until August 2007 when he sold Stag's Leap Wine Cellars to a consortium of Chateau St Michel and the Antinori family of Italy for US$185m!!

A renew interest in Judgement of Paris was developed by the movie Bottle Shock, a dramatized version of the event. If you look at the actual score, the difference between Stag's Leap and Mouton-Rothschild was very small, 0.05 point. So for a competition with eleven judges grading each wine out of 20 points with no predetermine grading guidelines, 0.05 point difference was a real flip of a coin. But this coin flip was perhaps the best marketing tool for Stag's Leap for over 20 years.

Mum signed up for the vintage release party for Stag's Leap Wine Cellars, the only other item in their itinerary which was pre-booked other than the dinners and accommodation in San Francisco. The estate is located along the Silverado Trail. It has an artfully built decent size man-made lake with a running creek of running water. You know it's man-made as soon as you see the color of the water which is turquoise blue. Dad knows the color well. It's the dye to stop the growth of algae in ponds. Still it's beautiful.

The event provided the tastings of the 3 latest vintage releases, Fay, SLV and Cask 23 in the beautiful surrounding of the estate. They also got a tour around the estate including going into the wine cellar inside the man-made caves and a taste of the freshly picked wine grapes. The caves were deep inside the hill and extended in different directions and there's even a banquet hall inside for special occasions. The ripen wine grapes were small and very sweet.

Wine Country - Wine Train, Merryvale, Taylor's Refresher

These three seemingly unrelated topics got lumped together because mum and dad saw them at around the same time. It's now difficult to disentangle the three.

The wine train is a 3 hour slow-train journey from Napa to St Helena and back. You are served lunch or dinner inside the train while you enjoy the views of the wine country. Mum and dad did not try the wine train, but their journey did get delayed by the wine train while waiting for it to go past.

Merryvale is a beautiful vineyard at St Helena, but they didn't spend much time there except buying a map poster that they haven't seen elsewhere.

The main attraction for them was in fact Taylor's Refresher, a famous burger joint with a steady stream of people lining up and waiting for their names to be called after they have ordered their choice of burgers. The seating are open-air and is located right across Merryvale. It has been serving burgers from the same roadside spot since 1949. The grease and fat in all the menu items were the best ingredients to line up your stomach before wine tastings.

Wine Country - Rubicon Estate

Some wineries are worth writing about because of the famous wines they produced, some vineyards have spectacular views. In this case the winery, Rubicon Estate, has a famous owner, Francis Ford Coppola and an almost theme park like atmosphere.

When you first enter the winery, the word "grand" comes to mind and that word will keep hitting you until you leave the estate. The wine cellar is located in a Victorian house surrounded by perfectly manicured garden with a few fruit trees dotted around the pathways. You can imagine Mickey and Minnie walk down these paths with their entourage following closely behind. The theme park settings continue inside the Victorian house where you would see some of Coppola's playthings being displayed including a car from an old movie. It's definitely worth stopping by just to experience the different atmosphere this winery imparts.

Wine Country - more vineyards and wineries

You might ask what is the biggest difference between the vineyards we saw in New Zealand and the ones we saw in Napa. The answer is - "Not a lot!". But in Napa, mum and dad saw rows and rows of ripen wine grapes hanging on the vine waiting to be picked. It was the harvest season after all. There were grapes on the vine and there were also crates after crates of harvested grapes. A special aroma permeated the air, especially around the wineries. It was the smell of grape juice, not red wine. The hand picked grapes were transported in crates holding half-a-ton of grapes each to grape crushing machines spewing out the juice and leaving the grape skins and branches out. You would not imagine a US$100 bottle of wine started with such humble beginning.

The economic climate probably created a surplus of grape production. There was a cardboard sign saying - "20 tons Cabernet Sauvignon grapes for sale". These are the independent growers who own vineyards but have no wine producing facilities selling to wineries who don't have their own grapes but pick and choose from others. As these grapes are perishable, they would go to waste if they can't find buyers. And this is precisely what's happening this year in Napa. Take a look at this weblink to see the predicament facing the grape growers this year.

San Francisco - Wine Country

Northern California is famous for its wine production. Wine tasting is an important item for a lot of travelers but less so for mum and dad, as they can never night from day after a few drinks. Unlike New Zealand where most of the wine cellars offer free tasting, the wine cellars around Napa all charges a fee and that can range from US$15 to US$ 30 for a simple tasting and US$45 or more for an elaborate sit down tasting. Given their capacity for alcohol, they only did tasting in 3 different wineries, Joseph Phelps, Silver Oak and Chateau St Jeans but they have visited a lot more wineries.

Amisfield Vineyard

Central Otago produces some wonderful Pinot Noir and Amisfield was just one of the 3 vineyards visited in this region, the other 2 being Felton Road and Mt. Difficulty. Central Otago's pinot noir is characterised by more complexity and aromas than other wine regions in New Zealand. This is immediately obvious even to a novice drinker. Unlike Burgundy's pinot noirs, most of Central Otago's pinot noirs are drinkable and delicious when it's released.

Amisfield offers beautiful cellar door and a bar restaurant serving high quality local food for lunch. Mum and dad shared a "Trust-the-Chef" lunch set menu and for NZD 90, they got 7 different dishes from a selection of appetizers to a few main courses. Shame they never brought any leftovers home!! Mum did ship a few bottles of those pinot noir home though, perhaps dad will let us share the spoil:)