A detour in Wine Country

It is an absolutely glorious morning here. The sun is definitely getting out of bed later these mornings and like everything in New York, it's a real spectacle to behold. From East the West the whole skyline is brushed with pinks and yellows and all the windows on the east side of the buildings reflect columns of light that make them look like they are on fire. It has become a favourite ritual of mine to let Steve bring me my book and coffee in bed while I watch New York wake up.
The sunsets are equally as exciting. The sky swirls with hues of purple and pink and makes the west sides of the buildings look they are melting in pools of liquid light. Twilight is this fleeting moment where last streaks of dusky, natural light are fused with the first neon lights of the iconic New York night. It gets me everytime.

I wish that I could take some pictures to show you what I am talking about but I recently lost my camera in a Redwood forest in California (R.I.P old faithful) who I now imagine is lying under a leaf somewhere, growing mould, only to be found by archeologists in 1000 years time who will conclude that in fact Vikings did still live in America in 2009. (pictures of Steve/Yeti/Eric the Red as evidence)

But now, more about Cal-i-for-neye-a : We decided that no trip to America would be complete without a visit to the Golden State. So, we boarded a plane, flew 4378km in 6 hours, crossed 3 hours worth of time zones and landed in San Francisco at midnight. By 10 the next morning we were flying (low lying, in our rented Nissan Almera- yeah baby!!) across the Golden Gate Bridge towards Wine country. The next 3 days were filled with the clinking of glasses and the smelling and slurping of wine and a subsequent memory loss that prevents me from writing anything further.......

Touring wine country requires methodical planning and care- none of which we used when rolling our way through the Napa, Sonoma and Dry Creek Valleys. It is rather daunting to be faced with about 1000 wineries to choose from, so our plan was simple. 1st winery farthest away, 2nd, 3rd and 4th wineries slightly closer to home, last winery closest to home.... I think you get the picture. More wine = less co-ordination = shorter distance to drive home. The best thing about America though is that it is illegal to be breathalized!! It breaches your right to personal security or some rubbish like that- so in order for the coppers to tell whether or not a driver has been drinking, they ask them to take the "walk the line test". Seriously, in 1st world America, the way to establish a person's sobriety is to make them walk a straight line....Whooopeee for us. Steve practiced walking the line for minutes every morning  (just to get his eye in) in case we got stopped. And of course we never did, this is wine country afterall- a place where coppers don't need to patrol the streets because people are taking their tastings seriously and behaving like mature and responsible adults..... Ja right!!!!!

In short, we had a magical time. We drank some of the finest wines that NoCal has to offer, we admired breathtaking vistas of thousands of vines turning red, brown and gold in the fall-time, we walked in the redwood forests which had trees 1400 years old and 300 feet high, (felt like something out of Lord of the Rings- most amazing forests I have ever been to) we revelled in the late summer sun and to top it all off we hired a tandem and cycled our way around the Dry Creek River Valley tasting wine. Operation Tandem was nothing short of a sleek, well-oiled machine running with Military precision, by the late afternoon the tandem was a bit to well oiled and I belive we were spotted trying to "bunny hop" the pavements in the Healdsburg plaza. The trip was a rip roaring success- We now have 3 cases of wine on their way to us in NY (we found the receipts stuffed into the panier of the tandem) and we trying to work out if we will have to drink them all (help!!!) or try and smuggle them back into the UK.

Our last day was back in San Fran with Steve's oldest buddy, who as a baby used to sit in his high-chair and throw food at a crawling, hungry Steve down below. Well I guess some things never change because Woodsy and Christina fattened us up with with noteworthy cooking and hospitality while we soaked up views of Golden Gate in a ghostly fog and a fireball sunset.

Before we knew it, our 5 days were up. It was time to be bundled back into the human sardine- can and shot across the sky for another 6 hours over America's great mountains, desserts and lakes to our home away from home. The sight of Manhattan's twinkling lights are like a soothing tonic to the weary traveller's soul, they are a beacon of safety in the dark night. I don't know what it is about this city, but it makes me feel so welcome, so at ease, as though I have been living here all my life.

PS: Winery with the best view is JOSEPH PHELPS
Winery to avoid at all costs is CASTELLO DI AMOROSA
Best for food and wine pairing WILLIAMSON WINES. This is owned by an Aussie (who Steve had a real bromance with) whose aim is to pair all wine with food- he has even made a wine to go with 2 day old pizza. Is a delightful character who proudly displayed his fat guts as " 500 grand worth of Research and development"