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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
SHOE! Re: Napa
Tell me about your Napa trip! Another one of my goals for the week is to start planning our trip to Napa/Sonoma. We've decided that our family vacation this year (mom, dad, brother, DH, myself) will be a visit to the area for some wine tastings. I am the planner in the family, so I'm going to put the trip together.
Re: SHOE! Re: Napa
OMG, I do not have enough text space to tell you all about it! It was the best vacation ever and anyone who even thinks they might someday like wine should go. When do you guys plan on going? I highly recommend going in Oct/Nov. Oct is harvest season but if you can hold out a week and go in Nov, all the rates will drop, it'll be less crowded but it'll still be gorgeous.
I have a couple pictures on FB from our honeymoon and a whole album at home. Do you want to stay in Napa or Sonoma? We stayed in the Napa valley in St. Helena but Yountville is really nice too. As is Oakville and Rutherford. I wasn't that impressed with Calistoga and definitely don't stay in the city of Napa. We spent 2 days in the Sonoma valley and it was very nice as well. We will possibly stay there the next time we go.
Oh gosh, what else do you need to know? I can recommend wineries, restaurants, B&B's...I picked up the Frommer's guide at B&N and read it every night for month's. I loved planning our HM and will gladly help you out! So exciting!
My boss just went in Oct and they rented a house. I think he was pretty satisfied with going that route. You'd get a kitchen so you could cook a couple nights and save some moola. They have a ton of deli's and markets full of fresh food options.
The B&B we stayed at had a pool; Wine Country Inn is the name of it. I think most places have pools there. Summer is a pretty popular time to go. I wouldn't stay in 2 different places unless you plan on splitting your week between SF and Napa/Sonoma. Most everything is no more than an hour away so you'd waste valuable drinking time on moving your stuff. Just my $0.02 though. Sonoma & Napa are only about an hour apart so when we did spend the day in Sonoma, we just got up a little earlier, ate breakfast and went on our way.
Depending on your budget, definitely look at some of the accomodations in Yountville. It's the more ritzy part of Napa (that's where all of Thomas Keller's restaurants are). St. Helena is more quaint and small townish. You won't go wrong either way but Yountville will probably have the really nice pool you are looking for.
SF is about 2 hours away so if you plan on spending a lot of time there, then I'd def get a room in the city for a couple nights. Are you going to fly out of SF or Oakland?
I did a lot of reasearch on tripadvisor.com also. It was very helpful.
Oooohh that Inn looks heavenly!
We'll probably fly into SF since we'll do some sightseeing there.
So what restaurants did you eat at? We are a bunch of food snobs, so I'm excited about the restaurants! And which were your favorite wineries that you visited?
It was so nice. And the breakfast was to die for. Look at the Villagio in Yountville too. So farking luxurious.
We're foodie snobs too.
Restaurants we loved: Martini House, Tra Vigne, Go Fish, Oakville Grocery (for lunch), Hurley's.
DO NOT miss Martini House! The cream of mushroom soup is so good you will want to bathe in it! And Go Fish has this lobster roll...holy ***. Best thing ever. We still talk about it. And the fig & arugula pizza at Tra Vigne is awesome (we got it as an app).
Restaurants we did not love: Cindy's Backstreet Kitchen, Boskos Trattoria, Taylor's Automatic Refresher (so effing overrated), Silverado Brewing Company
Restaurants we heard were great but didn't try but plan on trying next time: Cook, Bottega (Michael Chiarello's new place), Ad Hoc, Auberge du Soleil (this is a B&B that has a 5-star restaurant that we can't afford but they have a separate dining area that's not nearly as pricey but the food is just as good. Or so I've heard.)
And you have to stop by Olivier and get some basalmic vinegar & olive oils. That place is divine. Oh and don't miss out on Woodhouse Chocolates. Both are in St. Helena. Yum, yum, yum.
Our favorite tour was at Robert Mondavi. It was just very...complete. They took us through every step of the wine making process and Mondavi is like the godfather of wine there. It was great. We also really enjoyed V. Sattui (excellent deli), Sterling, Duckhorn, Louis Martini, Bella (fabulous caves and we got to do barrel tasting here) & BR Cohn. La Crema has a very nice tasting room in Healdsburg.
I've also heard that Peju, Frog's Leap & Rombauer are great but we didn't get a chance to stop at those. Oh, and Francis Ford Coppola's winery. We wanted to go there too but didn't get a chance.
Try to book tours ahead of time at some of these places; they really personalize it for you and that really made our trip that much better.
I'm going to put together a spread sheet to compare prices, amenities, etc. I know I would do a B&B if it were just J and I, but since it's the whole crew I have to look at it a little differently. I'm pretty sure a house is going to be the most reasonable way to go, but I'm definitely going to compare!
I LOVE TRIP PLANNING
We will definitely have to go to Robert Mondavi's. And Frogs Leap, which is my brother's fave. And Sterling, which mom loves. DH wants to go to Kendall Jackson. We all have our wines that we love, but I want us to try some new places, too.
Sterling was really awesome. They do a gondala ride up the mountain and the view is just amazing. Definitely take the time to find new places! V.Sattui has an amazing Chardonnay as does Rombauer (I'm assuming your H likes Kendall Jackson for their Chardonnay's).
Some good advice we got was to just drive up the Silverado Trail and stop wherever looked interesting. That's how we stumbled upon Duckhorn. We also stopped at this place called William Harrison. They had an amazing Cabernet Franc. I'd never even heard of that variety before but it's now one of my favorites!
I forgot to mention Greystone! It's the restaurant inside the Culinary Institute of America. We didn't get a chance to eat their but I really want to do that next time.
Let me know if you need anything else or have any questions! I will have to dig through all my stuff and see what other wineries I have notes on!