lgsjr – Power Tasting – The Wine Tasting Experience

Freixinet, Back When

There are many sparkling wines made around the various corners of Wine Country. Unquestionably the best and the best known is Champagne, which must be made in a particular section of northern France. There are some nice bubbly wines made in Napa Valley. The Germans and Austrians make Sekt. Italians produce Prosecco. And in Spain, not far from Barcelona, they grow grapes and make Cava from them. Among the best known Cavas in the United State was – and is – Freixinet.

Back in the day, far off in the past, we didn’t know about any of that. If it had bubbles, it was champagne. In fact, despite the fact that the French owned the name, there were (and still are, in a few instances) American sparkling wines that were called champagne, right there on the label. There was even something that had bubbles called Cold Duck; even then we knew that this stuff was awful.

Photo courtesy of Grupo Freixinet.

But we also knew that we couldn’t afford real Champagne. A bottle of Moet & Chandon might have cost $10, but that was a lot of money when we were just starting out on adult life. That was when we discovered Freixinet. In the beginning, it came in a frosted bottle. The bottle alone and a difficult-to-pronounce name made it seem so chic and, well, European. Later Freixinet offered their Cordon Negro in a black bottle, which added elegance to its appeal.

The fact that it cost about two dollars made it accessible even for our pocketbooks in those days. And so we opened it whenever there was something to celebrate: The end of the semester. Our team winning a championship. Friday. We had no idea how to open a bottle, what kind of glasses to pour it in or how to sip it. We just knew that it had bubbles and that we liked it.

Not that long ago, we had the opportunity to try it once again. By that point, we had been drinking real Champagne for many years and the Freixinet was a disappointment. Did we really drink that stuff?

Yes we did and it introduced us to sparkling wine, in itself and as a part of being grown-up. There was mystery and romance in a bottle of Freixinet, a sense that someday we could be sophisticated if we tried, if only we knew how. The idea of Freixinet was in many ways more important than what was in the bottle (or on the floor because we thought the right way to enjoy it was to spray some when we opened a bottle).

These days we only drink French Champagne and occasionally a top-end California sparkling wine. We know a great deal more about wine and wine tasting than we did in our youth, which we guess makes us more sophisticated. But do we really enjoy it any more than we did when we were drinking Freixinet back then? We’re not sure; alas, we can’t remember.

Once we hosted a blind tasting of Champagnes. Just for fun we included a bottle of Freixinet. One of our guests actually chose the Freixinet as her favorite. De gustibus non disputandem est as the Romans used to say (there’s no arguing with taste), nor with good memories.

Reims

Power Tasting has alluded to the French city of Reims in a number of previous issues, but we have never highlighted it as a Place to Visit. Perhaps the first thing we ought to say about Reims is how to pronounce it. Not easy for American mouths, it certainly is not Raymes or Reems as the spelling might indicate. You need to start with that French “r”, which sort of comes from saying the sound of the letter at the same time you are clearing your throat. The vowels don’t follow the usual American path either; they’re more like aah, as in “aah, phooey”. The “m” disappears altogether and is pronounced sort of like “n” as spoken through your nose. At least the “s” survives intact.

Maybe more Americans would go to Reims if they called it Smith, which the French have a hard time pronouncing correctly. Americans, at least those who love Champagne wine and medieval splendor should visit Reims, because the city has a lot of both. If you just want a day trip from Paris for wine tasting and sightseeing, Reims is perfect. And if you’re looking for a base for touring the Champagne region for several days, Champagne is perfect for that, too.

The Charles de Cazanove winery is five minutes’ walk from the Reims train station. Photo courtesy of the Union de Maisons de Champagne.

Reims is one of the two major centers of Champagne production, the other being Épernay. The best known grands maisons in Reims are Mumm, Veuve Clicquot, Pommery and Taittinger. There are many other lesser known houses in Reims, including Lanson, G. H. Martel and Cazanove. Getting to Reims from Paris is easy. There’s a TGV train from the Gare de l’Est that will get you there in under an hour. (TGV means train à grande vitesse, or very fast train.) Getting around once you’re there is more difficult. There are taxis at the train station or on-call and Uber works just like at home.

The “Smiling Angel” at the Cathedral of Reims.

Besides tasting the local sparkling wines, the Reims Cathedral is not to be missed. It was for more than twelve centuries the place where the kings of France were crowned, including Charles VII. He only got there because Joan of Arc captured the city from the English. The cathedral that now stands in Reims was built in the 13^th and 14^th centuries. The entire structure is a model of Gothic glory. Among the best loved sights are the “Smiling Angel” in one of the entrance arches, the extraordinary rose window and the Chagall windows in the Lady Chapel. The rose window had to be taken down – very carefully – and stored to preserve it during the First and Second World Wars. Other windows weren’t so lucky. That’s why they recruited Marc Chagall to replace the ones destroyed in the second war.

You can drive from Reims to Épernay in under an hour, but don’t. Drive slowly and admire the gorgeous countryside. Take small side roads, even get a bit lost, and visit some of the hundreds of Champagne houses between the two cities. They don’t get the volume of visitors that the big houses do, so they greet you just a bit more enthusiastically. And tell yourself how lucky you are to be in Champagne.

Schramsberg Vineyards

Schramsberg is a multi-faceted winery. It is famous for its sparkling wines but also produces, through a sister winery, Bordeaux-style wines and Pinot Noirs. It boasts a history that extends back to the 19^th century but is really a product of the 20^th (surely a pioneer in Napa Valley terms). They once called their wines “Champagne” but now refer to them as sparkling wines, although they were legally permitted to use the French word. Here we will focus on visiting Schramsberg in Calistoga to sample their sparkling wines.

The grounds and house at Schramsberg. Photo courtesy of WineMaps.

The property was indeed established as a winery in 1862 by a German immigrant named Jacob Schram. Schramsberg actually means Schram’s mountain, which is a bit of an altitudinal exaggeration. The winery ceased operation in 1912 and wasn’t used for wine until Jack and Jamie Davies bought it in 1965. (The sister winery is named Davies.) A few years later they issued a sparkler labeled as “Napa Valley Champagne”. Wineries that had used the term Champagne prior to 2006 were allowed to continue using the term; but the Davies, respectful of France, stopped doing so. Their sparkling wine achieved prominence when they were the first American wine to be served at the White House in 1972.

All this history is an interesting background to a visit to Schramsberg. The first thing visitors see is an attractive garden, with a large Victorian house behind it. These too were restored by the Davies, and it must have been their pride and joy, as well as their home. It is overall a visual reminder of the winemaking history that Schramsberg represents. Beyond the house is a stony entrance to the caves where the sparkling wines are aged. Some of them are from the 19^th century winery, expanded by the Davies in their times.

The entrance to Schramsberg’s caves. Photo courtesy of Self Tour Guides.

Touring the caves is a high point of a visit to Schramsberg, along with a tasting, of course. There are 2½ miles dug into the hill, the first half-mile attributable to Jacob Schram. Much like the French Champagne houses, Schramsberg ages its wines extensively, two years or more for their commercial production and up to eight years on the lees for their top wines, the Tête de Cuvée that they name for Herr Schram. Using the French term for their top wine indicates that they still remember that they used to call their products Champagne.

The tasting consists of five sparkling wines, including – depending on the day – a blanc de blanc, a blanc de noir and a rosé. Often there is a little something extra thrown in. There is also a tasting available with three sparklers and three reds, which we’ll skip over for now. Power Tasting does not review wines as such, but it is no surprise that these are among the best sparkling wines made in the United States. They are definitely Californian, since neither the soil nor the caves have the chalk that give true Champagne its distinctive taste.

It is best not to compare Schramsberg to a French Champagne. Take pleasure in it for what it is, rather than for what it is not. That’s good advice for enjoying anything, not just wine.

How to Taste Sparkling Wine

Wine tasting is a very simple process. Someone pours some wine into a glass. You pick it up and take a sip. Repeat. Of course there are many subtleties beyond that: smelling the wine, noting the color, swirling it around your mouth, etc. This process applies at wineries (and bars and homes) around the world.

Photo courtesy of Schramsberg Vineyards.

But tasting sparkling wine is somewhat different. There is more to it, in some ways, and less in others. So if you’re visiting a sparkling wine producer, anywhere from Champagne to Calistoga, here are some tips to add to your enjoyment.

Notice the glass. In the past, at least in the United States, the glasses for sparklers were coupes. Wide and shallow, they would enable the bubbles to tickle your nose. Of course, the wine rapidly became flat. For some reason, they’re still popular at weddings. Flutes then came into fashion. These tall, thin glasses kept the bubbles in and away from your nose, exposing as little of the surface of the wine in the glass to the air. Now, in many wineries that specialize in bubbly, the glasses are tulip-shaped, with a bit of a bulge at the bottom and narrowing at the top.
Enjoy the aroma. The reason the glass matters is that the shape affects what and how you smell it. Coupes are all about bubbles, so you’d better sip in a hurry without worrying about smelling the wine. Flutes retain the carbonation, but give less space for the aromas to expand in the glass. The tulip is kind of a compromise, allowing the smells to circulate a bit before you sip. So hold a flute as horizontally as you can and breathe in the delicate aromas of citrus and warm toast, often found in some sparkling wines. With a tulip, stick your nose into the glass right away, before even thinking of sipping.
Don’t swirl. With tasting of table wines, swirling it before sniffing and tasting adds to the enjoyment of the contents of the glass. Not so with sparkling wines. All swirling does is release some of the gas and thus the bubbles. So it detracts from your enjoyment.
Take a look at the bubbles. You should see a steady upward stream of them that should continue unabated for a while. If you don’t, the bottle has been open too long and has gone flat. Give it back to the server and ask for a new bottle to be opened. (If you’re doing this at someone’s home, smile and enjoy your glass of white wine.)
How long should the bubbles last? Scientists will tell us that some bubbles will be present for hours after being served. But the whole point of sparkling wine is to have a lot of fizz. Once it goes flat – practically if not scientifically – there’s no point in drinking it.
A bit more about bubbles. Cheaper, less well-made sparkling wine has big, fat bubbles. Because each one has more gas in it, it takes less time for more to get out of the wine, i.e., go flat. Smaller bubbles are more elegant and longer lasting and are found in premium sparkling wines.
Don’t over-intellectualize it. Despite all the above it’s still just wine, albeit fizzy wine. Savor it as you would any other fine wine and take in the scents and tastes emanating from the glass, without trying to make it a sacred experience.

April Fool’s: An Article Produced by Artificial Intelligence

Since AI seems to be taking over everything, we thought it would be fun to give it a chance to write an article for Power Tasting. Here’s what we got from ChatGPT with the following prompt: “Write a 400 word essay on the pleasure of wine tasting trips from the perspective of a wine lover:” The picture was also created by the same application. Please let us know what you think.

The Pleasure of Wine Tasting Trips: A Journey for the Senses

For a wine lover, few experiences compare to the delight of a wine tasting trip. Beyond simply drinking wine, these excursions offer an immersive journey into the artistry, culture, and terroir that shape each bottle. From the rolling vineyards of Napa Valley to the sun-drenched hills of Tuscany, wine tasting trips provide an unparalleled opportunity to deepen one’s appreciation for this ancient and complex craft.

The first pleasure of a wine tasting trip is the setting itself. Vineyards are often located in breathtakingly beautiful landscapes, where lush rows of grapevines stretch towards the horizon. Walking through these vineyards, one gains an immediate connection to the land, understanding how climate, soil, and geography influence a wine’s unique character. The experience is not just visual but deeply sensory—the scent of ripening grapes in the air, the crisp morning breeze, and the warm sun on one’s skin all heighten anticipation for the tasting ahead.

At the heart of the journey is the tasting experience. Each glass tells a story of craftsmanship, from the selection of grape varietals to the winemaking techniques that shape its aroma and flavor. Swirling a glass of wine, observing its color, and inhaling its bouquet before taking that first sip transforms drinking into an art. The interplay of flavors—fruity, earthy, spicy, or floral—unfolds on the palate, revealing layers of complexity. A knowledgeable sommelier or winemaker can elevate this experience by explaining the nuances of tannins, acidity, and aging processes, enriching one’s understanding and appreciation of the wine.

Pairing wine with local cuisine is another highlight of a tasting trip. Many wineries offer food pairings that showcase how wine interacts with different flavors, whether it’s a bold red complementing aged cheese or a crisp white enhancing the delicate taste of fresh seafood. These pairings highlight the harmony between wine and gastronomy, deepening one’s enjoyment.

Beyond the wine itself, tasting trips foster a sense of connection—both with the people behind the wines and with fellow enthusiasts. Conversations with winemakers reveal their passion and dedication, while shared tastings with other visitors create moments of camaraderie and discovery.

Ultimately, wine tasting trips offer more than just indulgence; they provide education, sensory pleasure, and cultural enrichment. For a wine lover, they are not just vacations but meaningful journeys that celebrate the art of winemaking and the joy of savoring life, one glass at a time.

Factory Wine Tasting

Generally, when we think of a winery, the image that comes to mind is a tasting room that is elegantly furnished with views of endless vistas of grapevines. Or urban tasing rooms that are clubby and well-decorated. There are two wineries in Santa Barbara that break that mold: Jaffurs and Carr. These two are unmistakably operated in a factory-like setting. They are in a light industrial section of Santa Barbara; there are no vistas at all, grapes or otherwise; and one of these is minimally furnished, if at all.

The entrance to Jaffurs Wine Cellars.

Jaffurs Wine Cellars makes Rhône-style wines in a facility that was purpose-built for winemaking by Craig Jaffurs in 2001. It has a garage door opening, with an iron table just inside where they serve tastings. The trend towards seated tastings by appointment only has not yet reached Jaffurs. Visitors enter, wait for some employee to notice them and then are served a selection of Jaffurs’ rather extensive list of wines.

Just beyond the, er, tasting room, visitors will see the crush pad and beyond that fork lifts tending to the barrels of wine waiting to age and be bottled. Unsurprisingly, Jaffurs does not get many visitors and so the vibe when people do come is real pleasure to show off their wines. And we did find Jaffurs’ wines quite enjoyable. Jaffurs sources all of their grapes from vineyards from the Sants Rita Hills to as far north as Santa Maria County. Many of them have significant reputations, most notably the Bien Nacido in Santa Maria.

Jaffurs doesn’t make very much wine – only 5,000 cases annually – and so is not widely distributed. Although the specialty of the house is Rhône grapes, which we liked, we found that we most enjoyed their Pinot Noir. They don’t make a big deal of it, so you have to ask to try some

As for Carr Winery, we are being a bit unfair when we say that it is a factory, although wine is made and aged there. Their facility was originally a Quonset Hut in the same industrial area as Jaffurs, and was used to repair World War II aircraft. There is a terrace outside but it is often used by a mah-jongg club, so we found it better to taste inside. This is nicely furnished to look something like a trendy cocktail lounge. There are artworks scattered about as well. Visitors can easily forget that they are in a working winery in a factory district.

The Carr Winery tasting room.

Almost all of Carr’s wines are 100% single varietals. There’s a little secret there: Ryan Carr, the owner and winemaker, also has a vineyard management business. With the insight gained from that enterprise, he buys grapes – ostensibly the best ones – from his customers. Accordingly, Carr makes wine from a wide variety of grapes, including the usual (Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah) and some that are less likely to be found elsewhere (Sangiovese, Cabernet Franc). Winemaker Carr has a definite style; there is a clear consistency in all his wines, regardless of the grapes used.

So if anyone would ever get tired of beautiful scenery and surroundings, we recommend a trip to the East Side of Santa Barbara, where Jaffurs and Carr will show you wines with an industrial ambiance but countryside quality.

Getting Around in Napa Valley

In our first forays into wine tasting, way back when, finding our way was simple if not easy. We would fly to San Francisco, rent a car and drive up to the Route 29 exit from I-80. Then it was a good 45 minutes until we reached the winemaking area of Napa Valley, which was the only part of Wine Country in the United States we’d ever heard of. We would continue up Route 29 until we saw a sign indicating a winery. We would go in, have a sip, take a glass and proceed to the next one. There weren’t that many wineries then, so it was easy to just keep going north until it was time to go to our hotel.

As more wineries opened and as we spread out to other American winemaking areas, we learned that the best plan was to stop at the first winery we encountered, regardless of our interest in that one, and pick up a tourist magazine. There would be (and still are) lots of ads for wine and wineries to visit, plus restaurants and hotels. That was all helpful in its way, but most important was the centerfold that contained a map showing where all the wineries were. At first, we’d pick a few wineries we wanted to visit and would drive from one to the other, without regard to the amount of time we’d be behind the wheel instead of in front of the bar.

There were a few problems with that approach. Wineries that paid for big advertisements in the magazine were highlighted on the map and smaller ones that couldn’t afford to advertise were omitted. If we knew of one of those and wanted to taste their wines, we’d have to call and get driving instructions, which we had to write down on whatever scrap of paper we had. That approach might have worked, but cell phones were new and coverage was spotty in rural areas.

Then came MapQuest. Before our trip, we would use that app to plot out the routes from one winery to another. This process was a bit difficult, because if we didn’t know where the wineries were, we would have to figure out in which order to plan the drive, which often necessitated repeated searches. And all these maps and instructions had to be printed out and taken with us. We well remember thick manilla folders of maps that the navigator had to fumble through once we arrived.

When GPS applications such as Google Maps replaced MapQuest as our go-to app, it solved a lot of problems, but it created a few others. Sometimes it simply got the instructions wrong. We well remember driving miles too far because Google sent us way off the route. Also, in some cases we remember from a trip to France, if there was a route that was two meters shorter than another, the GPS systems would take us along tiny paths, through farms and vineyards rather than on the main road that would have gotten us where we were going far faster.

Isn’t technology wonderful? We still think it’s fun to just wander a bit and find whatever we happen to find. Still, getting the tourist magazine still helps. This way we can figure out the location of all the wineries at one glance.

Artificial Intelligence for Wine Tasting

Artificial Intelligence seems to be on everyone’s lips these days, right where some nice wine ought to be. So we asked ourselves how AI could be used to enhance the wine tasting experience. We thought it might help in doing the pre-visit research into the wineries to visit, and so asked three popular AI platforms a test question, “What are the five best wine tasting experiences in Napa Valley?”

Picture courtesy of The Economic Times.

Here are the results:

Microsoft CoPilot

Napa Valley is a wine lover’s paradise, and here are five exceptional wine-tasting experiences to consider:

Andretti Winery

This winery combines award-winning wines with a touch of racing history, all set in a beautiful 42-acre estate.

Napa Valley Wine Country Tours

Offering private and group tours, this service provides a luxurious way to explore Napa’s finest wineries.

Monticello Vineyards

Known for its limited production estate wines, this family-run winery has a rich history and a reputation for excellence.

Vermeil Wines

Specializing in bold Calistoga red wines, this spot is perfect for those who love robust flavors.

Castello di Amorosa

A medieval-style castle winery offering a unique and immersive tasting experience.

Each of these places offers something special, whether it’s the ambiance, the history, or the wine itself.

OpenAI ChatGPT

Napa Valley offers a multitude of exceptional wine tasting experiences that cater to a variety of preferences. Here are five standout options to consider:

Opus One Winery

Renowned for its exclusive experiences and fine wines, Opus One offers intimate tours that delve into its winemaking philosophy and architecture.

Robert Mondavi Winery

Celebrated for its Fumé Blanc, this winery also boasts an impressive art collection and hosts summer concerts, blending culture with winemaking.

Inglenook

Owned by Francis Ford Coppola, Inglenook is praised for its wines and ambiance, offering a rich historical experience alongside tastings.

Raymond Vineyards

Known for its innovative and sensory tasting experiences, including the Crystal Cellar and the Red Room, providing a unique blend of wine and art.

Napa Valley Wine Train

A unique excursion that combines gourmet dining with wine tasting aboard a vintage train as it traverses the picturesque Napa Valley.

Each of these venues offers a distinct perspective on Napa Valley’s rich winemaking heritage, ensuring a memorable visit for both novices and connoisseurs alike. [Note: Most of these choices seem to have come from the London Times.]

Anthropic Claude

Based on my knowledge, here are five exceptional wine tasting experiences in Napa Valley:

Schramsberg Vineyards

Known for their exceptional sparkling wines and historic cave tours. Their guided cave tour takes you through hand-carved caves dating back to the 1800s while tasting their premium sparkling wines.

Castello di Amorosa

A meticulously recreated 13th-century Tuscan castle with medieval architecture, defensive towers, and a torture chamber. The unique setting pairs with their Italian-style wines for an immersive experience.

Chateau Montelena

Made famous by the “Judgment of Paris” in 1976 when their Chardonnay beat French wines in a blind tasting. Their stone chateau and Japanese gardens offer a beautiful setting for tasting their world-class wines.

Robert Mondavi Winery

A pioneer in Napa Valley winemaking offering educational tours and tastings that showcase the region’s winemaking history alongside their acclaimed wines, particularly their Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon.

Domaine Carneros

A stunning French-inspired château specializing in sparkling wines and Pinot Noir. Their terrace tastings overlook expansive vineyard views of the Carneros region.

These wineries combine exceptional wines with unique settings, educational experiences, and Napa’s picturesque landscapes.

It’s notable that none of the three lists is the same. We are familiar with all the wineries mentioned and agree with some choices, but not all. But a wine tasting trip to Napa Valley that included all of them would be very representative of the best experiences to be had in that section of Wine Country.

San Jose, California

If someone were to ask “Which is the largest city in Northern California’s Wine Country?”, we wager that most people would say San Francisco. It is large, with slightly more than 800,000 people. Sacramento is pretty big, too, with around 525,000 residents. But the biggest is San Jose, which is nearing 1 million in population.

San Jose has long been in San Francisco’s shadow, but the advent of the technology industry in the area has begun to give the city its own personality. Maybe that personality is not as flamboyant or historical and San Fran’s, but if you are tasting in the vicinity, it’s worth a stop. The most notable nearby winemaking regions are in the Santa Crus Mountains, with 80 wineries, and the Santa Clara Valley, with 60.

If you’re a sports fan, you probably have heard of the San Jose Sharks in the National Hockey League (there isn’t an NHL team in San Francisco) and the 49ers have SF on their helmets, although their Santa Clara Stadium is closer to San Jose. These teams mean that San Jose can legitimately call itself a major league city.

San Jose has a museum called The Tech Interactive. Now, many cities have science and technology museums, but this one is in the heart of Silicon Valley, so it takes on added relevance. There are more than 100 exhibits, many of which are powered by artificial intelligence (of course). But it’s not all gee-whiz technology. Some deal with space exploration and the biology of the human body.

The California Theater. Photo courtesy of Evergreene Architectural Arts.

As with any large city, San Jose has parks, gardens and art museums, but frankly they aren’t worth a special visit. These probably exist in your city back home, although it is nice that the San Joseans have cultural activities of their own. They have a symphony orchestra and an opera company, too, both of which perform at a renovated movie palace now called the California Theater. Its architecture resonates with echoes of past cinema glories.

Santana Row. Photo courtesy of Federal Realty Investment Trust.

We have most enjoyed the district known as Santana Row. It is San Jose’s center, with shops, restaurants, offices and pedestrian walkways. In some ways, Santana Row is much like the “downtowns” of planned communities around the country. In many ways the explosive growth of San Jose created a need for a place where residential, business and leisure would combine. And since there is a great deal of money for those working in tech, an invented civic center can be quite enjoyable. We find Santana Row to be the best reason to pay San Jose a visit. Unless you’re a hockey fan, that is.

Dealing with the Weather in Wine Country

Not surprisingly, climate is one of the major factors in terroir, the totality of the environment in which wine grapes are grown. A vineyard may have the best soil, the perfect exposure to the sun and excellent drainage, but if the growing season is too hot, too cold, too dry or too rainy, the resulting wines will suffer. In our travels, we have wilted with the heat and humidity, shuddered in cold fog, frozen in ice storms and, of course, luxuriated in balmy sunshine. Sometimes all in the same day!

One of the beauties of wine tasting trips is that Wine Country, with a little judicious planning, you can be sure to have great weather. Some years ago, Power Tasting published a series on wine tasting in Napa/Noma, one month at a time. And indeed, there are reasons to visit there all year long. The same may be said of most of the better winemaking regions of the world, including Burgundy, Bordeaux and even Long Island’s North Fork.

Napa Valley in February. Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Many times we have travelled to California in December and found ourselves in temperate days and cool nights, basically sweater weather. But there was one December when it was colder in Napa Valley than it was in New York. The parking lot at our hotel was a sheet of ice. We were used to doffing our heavy coats in Wine Country, but not that time.

Wine grapes grow especially well if they are in an area with overnight and morning fogs that burn off and are replaced by sunny, hot afternoons. In many parts of northern California, the shift from fog to sun is not gradual; it takes about fifteen minutes to go from grey to blue, usually around 10:30 in the morning. So if we set off earlier than that, we bundle up with long sleeves and coats, only to find ourselves overdressed by the time we reach our second winery.

It’s not just California where the weather can be so changeable. The south of France is famed for the mistral, the chilly wind that blows across the Mediterranean from Africa during the winter and early spring. No one told us that it can sometimes occur as early as September. So when we went there to experience the harvest, we were totally unprepared. The weather did hasten the vendange though.

There is the other extreme as well. There have been many trips when we have sweltered. There have been occasions that we retreated from the vineyards to dive into the pool at our hotel. The managers of European wineries are more sensible than us Americans. They close for lunch from around 1:00 until 3:00, then stay open until 6:00 or so. They go to lunch, so we visitors have to as well. Very civilized.

So before heading to Wine Country for a wine tasting trip, we try to remember to consult the weatherman. And then, if we expect heat, we also pack a sweater. And there are short-sleeve shirts in our luggage in winter. A packable light down jacket is often a great idea in any season. There’s just no telling.