For better or worse, more planning is required these days.<\/p>\n
- \n
- It still makes sense to limit a day\u2019s tastings geographically.<\/strong> We want to be tasting, not driving from Calistoga to Napa and then back to St. Helena.\u00a0 Why waste time behind the wheel when we could be in a tasting room?\u00a0 More important, when the purpose of the day\u2019s activities is sipping alcohol, it\u2019s really advisable to minimize driving as much as possible.<\/li>\n
- Appointments are necessary.<\/strong> Many wineries now have a \u201cBy Appointment Only<\/a>\u201d policy.\u00a0 Smaller wineries \u2013 and some of the larger, snootier ones \u2013 have long been that way. That prohibition was once a ruse to keep rowdy crowds away; today the tastings are seated and the limitation is for real.\u00a0 Since the pandemic, almost all Napa\/Noma wineries are available only with a reservation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/black_stallion1-300x214.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nA seated tasting at Black Stallion.\u00a0 Photo courtesy of the winery.<\/em><\/p>\n
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- Expect fewer but longer seated tastings.<\/strong> Many wineries, as a by-product of their appointment requirements, now only offer seated tastings.\u00a0 Bellying up to the bar is not an option anymore\u00a0or there is no bar to belly up to.\u00a0 Therefore, we taste on their schedules rather than our own.\u00a0 \u00a0The ambiance is more guest than bar patron, which has plusses and minuses.<\/li>\n
- Sharing is more difficult.<\/strong> Since they are seated tastings, two people can\u2019t occupy one chair.\u00a0 As a result, both will have a full tasting.\u00a0 Sure, we can each sip only a little but the temptation to take a few more sips is quite apparent and the cost of tasting becomes more expensive.<\/li>\n
- Lunch is more important than ever, but harder.<\/strong> If we are likely to drink a little more at each tasting, we need to get some food into us.\u00a0 But fitting in a restaurant between winery visits is a challenge, especially in areas where restaurants are few and far between.<\/li>\n
- Packing a picnic may be the only choice.<\/strong> There are no restaurants and often not even delis in certain areas.\u00a0 For example, there used to be the Jimtown Store<\/a> in Alexander Valley, but there isn\u2019t anything now.\u00a0 And try finding a restaurant in the further extremes of Russian River.\u00a0 Even with a packed lunch, there aren\u2019t that many wineries with picnic tables in Sonoma County and hardly any at all in Napa Valley.\u00a0 Dining in the car may be necessary but it\u2019s unpleasant.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
All of which is to say, Napa\/Noma still has some of America\u2019s best wineries available to visit.\u00a0 They just take more preparation to enjoy them than it used to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For more than four decades, we would travel to California at least once a year to go wine tasting.\u00a0 Occasionally we\u2019d go to the Central Coast or a smaller, outlying sector of California\u2019s Wine Country, which means most of the state.\u00a0 But usually our destination was either Napa Valley or Sonoma County, sometimes both.\u00a0 Then … Continue reading Planning for a Napa\/Noma Trip, Updated<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2194"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2200,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194\/revisions\/2200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
- Sharing is more difficult.<\/strong> Since they are seated tastings, two people can\u2019t occupy one chair.\u00a0 As a result, both will have a full tasting.\u00a0 Sure, we can each sip only a little but the temptation to take a few more sips is quite apparent and the cost of tasting becomes more expensive.<\/li>\n
- Appointments are necessary.<\/strong> Many wineries now have a \u201cBy Appointment Only<\/a>\u201d policy.\u00a0 Smaller wineries \u2013 and some of the larger, snootier ones \u2013 have long been that way. That prohibition was once a ruse to keep rowdy crowds away; today the tastings are seated and the limitation is for real.\u00a0 Since the pandemic, almost all Napa\/Noma wineries are available only with a reservation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n