Here’s a break down day by day of our little trip.

Kris, Daniel, Vic and I arrive on Saturday in Reno (yup, first class was rough but I had two bloody marys and some wine to help me through it!). We got the Jeep Cherokee and headed out to Tahoe. By the time we were finally in the condo and relaxing I think we were all tired from traveling. Kris, Vic and I went for a walk amongst the gorgeous scenery there up on the mountainside. Saturday night was sushi!! yummmm….

Sunday, we drove to the far side of the lake and hiked up to one of the big waterfalls. That was a lot of fun! I found a large boulder sitting right in the middle of a bunch of roaring rapids. Despite the intensity of the churning water about me, I found it very peaceful so I sat down and faced out towards the valley and the lake for a bit. I think it was Sunday night that we ate at Cafe Fiore in town. A bit pricey, but excellent Italian food and wine well worth the money.

Monday was wine tasting in Napa Valley. The scenery is different from Tahoe, but just as beautiful. They absolutely pack in those wineries and vineyards everywhere they can! That evening we met up with Victor’s cousin in San Francisco for drinks, then met up with one of Daniel’s friends for dinner and crashed at his place.

Tuesday we did some more tastings in Napa and finished up with a personalized tour at Flora Springs. It really paid off to have someone from a steakhouse along with us! (Vic and Daniel both work at Blade’s in Fort Worth). All along we got free wine tastings, and finally Richard at Flora Springs gave us a great tour of the vineyard to just the four of us. The winery has a large set of caves dug into the hillside where they store their casks of wine (which we got to try straight out of the cask!). And, best of all, we finished up the evening with Victor more smashed than I’ve ever seen him.
While in Napa we also visited the Copia wine museum. That was very cool. All sorts of interesting interactive exhibits and facts about the history of wine, and a beautiful garden to walk through to boot.

I highly recommend everywhere we went. Tahoe has some great hiking, and if you’re a wine connisseur you will love Napa. I can’t wait to go back and see more of San Francisco with Ian sometime.