CA Trip: Napa Valley Day 1

Warning folks! The next few posts will be about my California trip and not crafty related. So feel free to come back at a later time or you can scroll down and relive it with me...

Between Maria and I we took thousands of pictures. I won't subject you to EACH and EVERY one of them but try to give an overview…

First order of business upon arriving at California. Find an IN-N-OUT burger joint. Before biting into that 11,000+ calorie Double-Double burger, I didn't understand what all the hype was about. Let's just say…UUUUMMMMMMM!!!! Something so satisfying about eating a burger at 1am in the morning...

Castello di Amorosa. Our first winery to visit and it's a real honest-to-goodness castle. And do you know what stands out in my memory? Vicenzo, the Italian hottie behind the bar, and how he said Naaah-deeene. Made my knees puddle to the ground. Oh, and how I was trying not to spit the red wine out in front of him…

Next stop, V. Sattiu to get a picnic lunch at the deli and a quick tasting at the bar. The place was PACKED! The only stop in Napa Valley where I felt crowded.

Oops, no time to eat! We've got to get to Schramsberg to do the cellar tour of the sparkling wines. Thank GOODNESS it was an underground tour. It was a sweltering 102 degrees outside! The Hawaii girls were melting…it's usually a balmy 88 degrees in the islands…

The tour ended with a wine tasting on this FABULOUS table made from riddling boards. I want this for my home! It was interesting to see how the various pieces of winery equipment was recyled and re-used into furniture.

No time for the scenic picnic deli lunch we planned to do under a tree in a winery overlooking the hills of Napa.  Hurry, hurry, hurry! We've got 10 minutes before the spa and mud bath reservations…so it's eat in the car with the A/C on full blast.

I KNOW. This is SUCH an attractive picture of me. But Im keeping it real for all my fans out there…see celebrities need to eat too…




I didn't get any pictures of spa time…we were mostly nekkid the whole time. Though Im pretty sure Maria has a couple while we were immersed in the mud.  Can I just say that it was a really squishy experience? The smell of the peat moss/mud mixture was overwhelming. Would I do it again? No. But at least I can say I did it once in my lifetime. Im also kinda miffed that I didn't get the near orgasmic episode that Maria had during her massage or how comatose Treslyn got after HER massage.

Dinner at the The Wine Spectator Greystone Restaurant or CIA (as we kept calling it).  The food was delicious but we were not thrilled with the ambience of the restaurant. It was very loud in there…the high ceilings just magnified the sounds…I couldn't hear a word the other girls were saying unless they shouted. Another thing, it was like sitting in a brick oven. Maria almost had a heat stroke in there. I know we came on the hottest day EVER but has no one heard of an A/C?

I had the Prosiutto Wrapped Cod with broccolini and white bean relish. Maria had the Crispy Chicken Confit with frisee salad, mushrooms, and poached egg. Treslyn had the Grilled Petite Hanger Steak with roasted fingerlings, fava beans, balsamic red onions, and Gorgonzola. The food was very yummy and flavorful. No complaints whatsoever there.


Back to the hotel to collapse. Reflect on our first day away being tourists in Napa. Call the kids and give goodnight kisses over the phone. Also try and figure out how we were gonna get the wine home that we swore we would not be buying. But since they were exclusive to the winery and not sold at any retail locations near us, how could we resist?


Tomorrow, we'll be visiting more wineries…Joseph Phelps, Sterling, Provenance, and Rubicon.