Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Sideways

If I were a grape, I wouldn't mind living here.......

It ain't Chateau Souverain but, the wines are remarkable. Many ....... Robert Parker 90+


Our absolutely favourite sign from the entire trip.........so far


One little fact that we overlooked when coming to the Santa Barbara wine region was that the movie “Sideways” was filmed here, not in Napa Valley as we thought. And……. has this area ever made a BIG deal of that. Our RV Park is next door to the hotel used in the movie. Darn near every winery we have been in was used in the movie. We had dinner across the street from a restaurant used in the movie, yadda, yadda………

Fess Parker (Davy Crockett to us old farts) has a winery here (yup...he's still alive); the Firestone Winery (of the “Bachelor” fame) is here; and our favourite so far, the Foxen Winery (“if you don’t know Foxen – you don’t know Dick……or Bill”) is here.

What a great region. The wineries are run by owner/operators who grow their own grapes and produce hand-crafted, limited production, estate-bottled wines, of which they are justifiably proud. There is none of the corporate nonsense and silliness associated with Napa………yet! These are real people and real honest wine production on a small scale. The entire valley is bursting with spring as the grape vines bud and the fruit trees blossom. You can just tell that in ten years it will all be Napa II but…….. for the moment it is a real treat. The winding, hilly roads between wineries have none of the Napa traffic…..yet. The prices for vertical or horizontal tastings are not high……yet. Walk-in customers are welcome at wineries and restaurants……….so far. A bit of advice………get here soon! The scenery is beautiful!! The little towns of Buellton, Solvang, Los Olivos, etc are extremely scenic and, almost devoid of tourists.

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