Boobapalooza Napa Valley Wine Tasting Tour (July 26th, 2003)

We all planned to head up to Napa Valley and tour the various vineyards starting from St. Helena back to Napa. Mandy and her husband, Chris, drove to our house and met us at about 7:45 AM at our house. Mandy is like my little sis so I was looking forward to hanging out with her all day. I hadn't seen Marlo in such a long while either and couldn't wait to see her, as well Plus all of the new friends we all planned on finally meeting -- It was going to be a great day!

We (Mandy, Chris, Marc and I) drove up together to Napa, about an hour away and arrived at the Napa Town Center where everyone was meeting at 10 AM. Everyone started trickling in, Darlene and her hubby, Bill (Sgt. Bill Rocks! He reminds me of the drill sergeant on the show, 'Mail Call' - you know, the guy who says, "you ask the questions, maggot!"). Then, Diana and Jeff show up, our resident brilliant couple! Sherri and Dan, Sherri and Dan are a lot of fun, and Dan was so helpful. He seems like such a planner, he helped me find out what the heck we were doing at the Welcome Center, helped me get the maps and then he and Sherri recommended V. Sattui Winery which was a great suggestion! Then Joanna and her hubby, Derek showed up with Vibi and Albert. Roseann and Samantha showed up a little late and poor Kathy who was flying all the way from the east coast said she'd meet us at Beringer, our first stop in St Helena. Marlo called and said she'd meet us at Beringer as well, as they were running late because a group of students had "forked" their yard the night before, LOLOL!!! Apparently, "forking" is when you take hundreds of plastic forks and stab them, handle up, into the front lawn. Marlo is a teacher and her students sure love her!

click on all photos for a larger image


Vibi, Joanna, Mandy, M, Sherri, Darlene & Diana	Vibi, Joanna, Mandy, M, Sherri, Darlene & Diana

Sgt Bill, Darlene, Jeff, Diana, M, Chris, Sherri, Dan

We all got to Beringer, bought tickets for the 12:30 PM tour and waited for Kathy and Marlo to show up. I love me some Marlo! Kathy was such a doll, and such a good sport -- she had been through hell and back to get there and was in a great mood! We all went in and started our tour and the tourguide was like a kindergarten teacher, all bubbly and informative. She showed us the wine caves and huge barrels and small barrels and what not, explained the process and then led us to taste really cheap-tasting (lol) wine in their tour tasting room. Some Chardonnay and some rosy stuff that Chris seemed to like and bought a few bottles of. BTW Mandy, Johanna and myself were carded before we got to have a wineglass, YAY!

click on all photos for a larger image


Beringer Wine Caves	Marlo, M & Rosie

Diana, Joanna, Vibi, Marlo, M, Mandy,
Sam, Rosie, Sherri - Darlene (foreground)

Next stop was the main tasting room and I tasted a flight of reds - and they were pretty good. too! Mandy, Chris, Marlo and a few of us were at the tasting bar trying different wines, and making the wine pourer turn beet-red because we told him we were from Yes They're Fake! LOL!!

click on all photos for a larger image


Marlo, M & Mandy (long day)	Marlo, Sam, Rosie

We then went to the Private Reserve Room in the Rhine House Mansion. We had a flight of dessert wines called "How Sweet It Is" -- A Riesling, my favorite Nightingale Semillon-Blanc and a Port. It was so good!

click on all photos for a larger image


The Beringer Rhine House Mansion	Joanna Chris Mandy, M outside the Rhine House with a bottle of Riesling

Next we went to V. Sattui -- thank you Sherri and Derek for your recommendation! -- where we had great wine, food and fun. I highly recommend this place. They have some great brie, and this really good pate foie canard (a pate made from duck liver). I know I gave a speech about goose liver pate and how they force feed the geese with a rubberband around their throat to keep them from regurgitating the feed. Therefore causing the goose to have a very fatty liver. And Sherri said, "but it's duck." So, I tasted it on a bit of baguette with some brie and said OMG that's good! I also had some of Kathy's crab cakes and that was really good too!!. Sherri and Derek had bought a bottle of this V. Sattui Gamay Rouge and that was greeeeeeeat! What a great day in the filtered sunlight, with a warm breeze blowing through the valley, sitting around with friends.

Next stop Cakebread! We bought the tasting option which included a crystal tasting-glass decorated with the Cakebread Cellars logo, which you can keep! They were getting ready to close and it seemed as though they were rushing us out.

It was pretty hot by then and traffic was getting bad so we decided to head out to San Francisco to get some wings and Sangria at Hooters. Derek had to go to work so Joanna and the gang went to go back to their house and would meet us at Hooters later.

The Looong Journey For Food
It took us at over 2 1/2 hours to get there because of the traffic because of the Giants' game. Once we got into the city and parked and walked to Hooters everyone was starving. The hostess told us there would be a 15 min wait. So be it, we waited and waited and waited. An hour and 15 min later we were again told we would be sat in "about 15 minutes." So we waited and we waited and we waited -- it got dark and we still waited. We still hadn't got in touch with Marlo, Sam and Roseann. Try getting a good signal on Fisherman's Wharf. I finally got in touch with Marlo, Rosie and Sam who were were in front of Hard Rock Cafe. Apparently Rosie kidnapped Marlo and told us she had to eat and would meet us later -- okay, I never got that. It's like we are a block down, hello! So , we continued to wait...

Here are some pics of Marlo, Rosie and Sam at Hard Rock

click on all photos for a larger image


Sam, Rosie & Marlo	Sam, Rosie & Marlo

And of course, us still waiting...

click on all photos for a larger image


Mandycane, Sherri & Dan	Dan's arm, M & Marc

Sick of waiting to get into Hooters, we took off to Joe's Crab Shack and finally got in. We were freezing (Thank you Chris for lending me your sweatshirt/jacket thingy!!) so a few of us got some Keoke coffees while we waited for our table. We were starved! After we were sat and I had an episode of yelling on the phone at Roseann, we gorged ourselves on seafood and cocktails and had a great time!!

click on all photos for a larger image


Dan & Sherri	Dan & Sherri - searching the menu!

Darlene, Sgt Bill, M, Marc, Mandy, Vibi, Joanna

We then said our goodbyes and later on Mandy, Chris, Marc and I met Marlo and Rosie at O'Kane's in San Ramon and had a few more drinks and spent some quiet time together. We called it a night at about 2:00 AM and then went back to our house so Mandy and Chris could get their car.

It was a great day! It was a long and traffic filled day though. What would we do differently, bypass San Fran and NEVER, ever go to Hooters of San Fran again -- ever. Vegas will be a blast though, 3 days of at-your-own-pace partying, eating and shopping

click on photo for a larger image

Marlo & M