So, when we left off last time, Lea and I had just finished a 9 hour drive looking for a place to lay down for the night and had finally found one in Sonoma, about 200 miles north of where we had planned. I will say, it was well worth the trip.  Lea and I had never been to the town square in Sonoma, so we ended up ticking one off the bucket list, after all.  For breakfast, Jared recommended Sunflower Caffe as “the” cafe on the square (looked like there were some other contenders on the block).

I got a breakfast parfait that substituted yogurt for kefir (think Sutherland), which was similar to yogurt, but runnier.  Anyway, I’d never heard of it so thought it was worth a mention.

Around this time, Lea had also confirmed that even though the place in Big Sur was holding the room that we couldn’t get to, they wouldn’t charge us.  In fact, we re-booked for Memorial Day Weekend and they comped us a night.  It all worked out in the end!

As I was working on getting out an earlier blog post, I told these two knuckleheads to go for a walk around the square so I could get some peace and quiet.  They came back with a couple nice pictures. 🙂

After breakfast, we decided that today would be perfect for some wine tasting.  While JP was freshening up I took a few pictures of the place he, I mean we, were house sitting.  It’s really modern inside, and sits on a massive lot.

Some of the more notable features of the house include these massive grape vines that look like dinosaur fossils, and…this super refreshing outdoor shower!  Say “hi” Jerry!   He’s such a good sport. 🙂

Once he was finally done rinse-wash-repeating, we finally got out of the house and on to our first stop of the day at Gundlach Bundschu.  It’s spelled just like it sounds.  OK, maybe not.  But this helps…(hint: the third item is a “bun”).

It’s been a while since I’ve been so floored by the nose on a wine.  They had a Gewurz’ that screamed passion fruit.  OMG…  And a pinot that smelled like I had just dunked my head in strawberry jam.  These are good things.  At least for me, anyway.

 

Outside we noticed these adirondack chairs made completely of barrel staves.  This is exactly the kind of inspiration I was looking for when we had about 150 staves lying around.  Instead, we now have 150 candle holders.  Which reminds me – let me know if you want a barrel stave with holes notched out for tea lights.  We have some.

A peak inside the cave…

One down, one to go.  One of the best known wineries in all of wine country that we had somehow never paid a visit to before is Chateau St. Jean.  So we made a dash across the valley to check it out.

 

Here she is – Chateau St. Jean.  Nestled up in a comfy little spot at the base of the hill.

 

This was a big departure from the family owned winery of our last stop.  The grounds were very impressive.

 

 

JP knows his way around this place.  St. Jean is one of the brands in his company’s portfolio so he’s been here a time or twenty.

After making our way through the tasting list, we decided to pop a squat (or is it “squat a pop” Wise and Crawford?) in the main tasting room for some charcuterie and a couple glasses of the reserve pinot.  Nice, even pours, Jerry.  I’m drinking the non-reserve version of this as I type this, by the way. 🙂

At the tail end of this stop, my folks made the mistake of calling us.  I think we kept them on the phone for 1.5 hours.  We were all a little bushed from the long night before, so decided it would be wise for a nap before dinner.  Lea was the only one who got one.  We had seen a place earlier in the day called Hopmonk Tavern and I knew that if this was to be our one day in Sonoma, I had to go to here.  They had beers on tap that are hard to find in the open market.  We had three:

1. I started with a Duchesse, which my boy Lampe had recently introduced me to.  As far as sour ales go, this one is pretty sweet and tangy.  We ended up splitting it between us and a few new friends sitting at the bar next to us.
2. JP requested a Russian River Blind Pig IPA.  Lampe – you salivating, yet?
3. I ended up tasting a few nips before settling on the Goose Island Matilda Belgian IPA.  One of my new favorites.

 

M’lady’s birthday is April 7, so even though it was a bit early, JP took us out for a birthday dinner at El Dorado Kitchen in the El Dorado Hotel.  It was fantastic, and I know Jared has pictures that I don’t have.  Like we do at most places, we stayed until the staff started turning chairs over the tables and vacuuming.  What a day.  The best part?  None of us saw it coming!  Spoiler alert: tomorrow we pay a visit to some very “old” friends.