9th September 2009
The Sonoma and Napa valleys are great places to visit, very picturesque, and not unlike a browner version of home (their grass seems to be brown rather than green). With their many vineyards stretching for as far as the eye can see.
However, aside from wine tasting and shopping in the small and very pretty towns in the area such as Sonoma, St Helena and Healdsburg, and the hot springs and spas available around Calistoga, we’ve found very little to do here apart from wine tasting. The area lives, breathes and sells wine. That’s fine, but unfortunately without staying in one of those pretty little towns (and everything is so far apart that even then), you do need a car to get around here.
That’s why yesterday we did a wine tour that visited 4 winerys where we tasted a variety of wines, red and white, sweet and dry with some roses thrown in for good measures. I’ve never been particularly good at drinking at lunchtime, never mind from the 10.30ish that we were starting at, so after about 2 bottles of wine in total yesterday evening was pretty much a write off.
So, today we decided to avoid the wine (besides, we just end up buying it, which of course is the plan, but means we’ll be home before Christmas if we continue). We visited a place called Sonoma Cornerstone.
This is a sort of garden centre California style, with boutique style garden sculpture shops, a posh cafe serving organic food and a collection of about 18 gardens designed by up and comming landscape artists.
Some of the gardens were really interesting, while some were a little bizarre, but we did enjoy a nice lunch sat by the lily pond, before spending some time wandering around.
Back at base, it was a case of the mundane, laundry (which you have to do even while travelling) followed by shopping for tea and packing. It’s not all excitement and thrills you know!!