i'm old! as my father noted, i'm a year past a quarter century old, as of yesterday. (and my mother said in response, "then you know what that makes us-- old!!") despite the unstoppable aging process, i had an excellent birthday. it was a beautiful crisp december day (crisp by california standards, which translates to "quite pleasant for december" :)), making it a lovely day for wine-tasting. heather, liz, and marla planned a day trip to several wineries in the santa cruz mountains, complete with picnic and wine all around.

our agenda included:
1) a stop at the byington vineyard and winery off of bear creek road, where we were greeted with sweeping vistas of the valley and an almost-clear (but still slightly foggy at the coast) view of the ocean. the vineyard was picked bare, as is expected in december, but the area was lovely. the tasting room was a bright stone lobby resplendent with christmas tree, and the wine-pourer was pleasant and somewhat informative. we liked almost every wine we tasted, and bought a bottle of alliage, a sonoma county red that byington is known for. we explored the premises a bit, and discovered that the place is well-suited for intimate (read: small) weddings. we then picnicked out by the vineyards, played some bocce ball, and went on our merry way.

2) our second stop was at the reknowned bonny doon tasting room. interestingly, despite this winery's reputation for a fun and feisty feel, we were not very impressed with the wines. we tasted two whites (one was not bad but plain, and the other we didn't like much) and three reds (none of which we liked much-- even me, who likes reds! marla's lips kept pursing from all of the tannins). our salvation (and our purchases) came in the form of dessert wines, which were yummy! they had a sweet peach dessert wine ("viognier doux") as well as a dark raspberry wine ("framboise") perfect for consumption with dark chocolate-- which is actually how they served it! liz, marla, and heather bought bottles of the raspberry wine for themselves, and a bottle of each of the dessert wines for me. i can't wait to drink them!

3) we then ventured into town and stopped at wine-tasting rooms for storr's and beauregard. beauregard had a chardonnay that was decent (liz and marla really liked it), but storr's was pretty blah. it's more fun to taste at a vineyard, anyway.

so, that being said... we have tentative plans to explore the ukiah/booneville area for wineries and breweries in the spring. we're due for a camping trip, anyway. :)

thanks for all the calls and stuff, by the way. i feel loved!