Day 2

Day 2: More Napa!

Explored the Bothe-Napa park, took a stroll in the pioneer cemetery and met a rattle snake, and tried to reschedule a few camping reservations before heading out. Because our plans had been shifted a day ahead (due to missing the train) we sort of had to make moves on the fly (not that we’d had super detailed plans to begin with — spontaneity is healthy).

We started out the wine day by biking down Larkmead Lane, which is right out of Bothe-Napa State Park. Stopped by Frank’s Family Vineyard, and headed south on the Silverado Trail. The Silverado is a less-traveled road with plenty of trees and, of course, miles upon miles of vineyards. Beautiful! I bet it will be even more beautiful when (or if) we go back in the fall, when the grapes are plumping. Had many places on the list of “cheap or free wine tastings” but did not visit all. One stop was Markham Vineyards, to peruse their Rolling Stones classical rock photo gallery.

Markham’s Sauvignon Blanc was featured in the Today Show  “the best wines for warm weather” I think I will post the video clip in here because I think TV anchors are funny.

I’m trying to think of the perfect word to describe anchors — something like “ridiculously attempting to be hip and failing”.  The clip is pretty interesting, apparently if it’s 110 degrees (“global warming is all over our face,” says the anchor woman), the wine of choice is Stella beer.

Click here to watch…

Anyway back to the road. We eventually turned on to the main highway to check out a few of the bigger wineries. Made a stop in Sutter Homes (very well known as the cheapest wine in town) and had a few free samplings (free salsa, honey mustard and olive oil dips too!).  Then we went across the street to V. Sattui, where we bought cheese (beer soaked cheese) and baguette and had ourselves a little picnic. I think this was our last real stop of the day, it was very pleasant to relax for an hour after all the biking (also pictured: cute mini Sutter wine bottle).

Took a bit longer to get to our campsite than we anticipated. It was rounding on seven o’clock and we started to panic a little. The guy (Randy, I still remember) at the reservation office had told us “gate closes at seven” and didn’t seem very flexible about it. The park is really the only place in town to camp, unfortunately. We were just approaching the park when I saw a truck pull out, so I waved a bit hoping to be let in, but the guy (Randy, I’m assuming) just shrugged his shoulders so I booked it for the gate as it was closing. We barely made it in with our lives! Ha.

“Skyline Wilderness Park” is an interesting RV Park/archery range/disc golf/mountain biking/military training/gnat infested sort of place. Not the worst place to spend the night for $20, and at this point I just felt lucky we had a (legal) place to sleep.

So that was Day 2!