THE WINE DIARIES

THE CALIFORNIA WINE TRAIL

- David Grant

You are standing in line inside JFK looking down at your ticket. What zone am I? This is the question you are asking yourself when you get the call from your Dr. Your biopsy results are in.

This could go either way. For me I was fortunate to have good biopsy news and I’m here to say, it is a great way to start off a trip to California wine country.

After a relatively uneventful flight on Delta (that’s a compliment). The only complaint I have is how is it possible that the movie, The Hangover 2 was the exactly the same as the first one? I guess I can’t pin this one on Delta.

It’s as if someone had a script and did FIND/REPLACE with Child/Monkey, Las Vegas/Bangkok, and car/boat. Was there a writing deadline (or MANY deadlines) missed?

I arrive at SFO, meet Beth, get a car and after a brief detour of Oakland (ended up on Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd) we are headed north.

Given it is Thursday evening we head straight for a restaurant where we have a reservation named Compadres Rio Grill. Yes, a Mexican restaurant is our first stop in wine country.

No one is in the restaurant leading us to quickly figure out that this area is over by 8pm. We eat fajitas, enchiladas, and dos Margaritas (each) by ourselves.

We are staying at the Napa Best Western Premier. For those unaware “Premier” equals “Fancy” and equals having an extra toothbrush when I realized I had forgot to bring mine (fancy).

Unpacked, it is still early so we walk across the parking lot to the Red Hen Cantina. We drink good Margaritas and wonder where all of the people are.