Winery & Tasting Room
I’ve been down all late last week and weekend with a bad cold/fever. My voice is gone now from the sore throat and coughing but the fever seems to have stopped. That’s why there have been no blogs this weekend. Stef’s been busy keeping soup and water in me.
We did get a nice review from the San Diego event this morning though that I wanted to share:
We will be pouring at another event this coming Tuesday in downtown San Jose.
http://www.ccboutiquewines.com/html/events.php
We are really excited about this event, it’s our first in the city of San Jose, and the location is fantastic. The cost is $50 and it runs from 5 PM until 7:30 PM.
I planning on pouring four or five wines, including our 2007 Syrah. Please stop by and say hello.
We arrived back in San Jose Sunday afternoon. It had been more days in hotels over the last few weeks than at home, and we’ve spent the last few days catching up on tasks and a lot of paperwork in the winery.
We visited Nashville last week. My sister had moved there last August and it was our first trip to see her and family. My Mom joined us for the trip and we left our computers at home. We arrived Wednesday night and had dinner with the family. Thursday Stefania and I went out exploring central Tennessee. We stopped at a winery, which we later found out was owned by one of the Brooks and Dunn country singing pair. I had no idea who the owner was while at the winery although the cheesy picture of the owner on all the handouts should have clued me in.
We also visited the George Dickle distillery. No small feat. One of the hobbies of folks in Tennessee is to steal road signs to the George Dickle distillery. We closed Thursday evening watching the Sharks play the Predators then listening to live music in downtown Nashville.
Friday we explored downtown some more and had dinner at our friend Gerard’s house. Really great smoked steaks and lots of good wine. Saturday there was a little tornado scare. Mostly the newscaster was in a complete emotional melt down and scared, but the storm passed through fine and we went to a wonderful wine dinner at Flyte in downtown Nashville. We had aged Hermitage Blanc (interesting), some older Bordeaux (very good) and a host of other great wines. It was a great multi course 5+ hour dinner. I brought along some of our 07 Syrah and 07 Pinot Noir for everyone to try.
We’re settled back in now and should have more regular updates on our activities as Spring starts.
I hate the telephone. But I love the new iphone. This piece of technology is very cool. I can still communicate without actually talking.
Here’s the thing. The only time I’ll answer the phone is if I happen to be sitting still at my desk and playing around, like now, writing a blog. This isn’t exactly “work” and I will stop this to pick up, should it ring. Otherwise, forget it.
Why?
Because I’m always moving, I’m always doing something. If I had a Facebook account, my status would change every 15 minutes or so. “Stefania is…. checking the rose garden, taking out the trash, making the bed, paying bills, re-designing the next label, filing, sending a fax, checking the chemicals in the hot tub, in the hot tub(!), etc”
I don’t take the phone with me everywhere I go and I don’t drop whatever it is I’m doing to pick up. If it’s important, leave a message and I’ll call back…usually. I called my brother just before the San Diego trip and wanted to check in and tell him about my new phone.
He called while I was in the pool at the hotel and left a scathing (not really) message that I never pick up or answer. When I called him back I was like, hey, baby steps dude, did you notice there was a voice mail greeting? First time in 8 years I’ve recorded one. Baby steps.
My hearing has been compromised since I was in high school. I’m not deaf, but I do have limits to what I can hear, and talking on the telephone is generally unpleasant if there are any other noises or distractions. So I avoid it. There are times when it is necessary and I do conduct winery business via telephone, but socially, there are better ways to reach me.
It’s even worse if you have an accent or are foreign born. I’m a lip-reader in those cases and you can’t read lips thru the telephone.
Email: [email protected]
Text: 408-888-0714
Yahoo IM: [email protected]
If a phone call is more appropriate, feel free, but leave a message and a call back number because I’m probably already doing something else.
Cheers.
In my blog about the recent trade shows I was talking about the public session and I said:
“I love the guy with a notebook… That notebook means the person is serious about wine, and more importantly looking for something new and memorable. I’m confident in my wine. I know if they are taking it seriously and giving it a chance, they’ll be impressed.”
Check out the posting below to see just what I meant:
http://dat.erobertparker.com/bboard/showthread.php?t=193496
Phil Carpenter actually introduced himself and we spent a good amount of time talking and visiting with him and his family. His Father-in-Law really liked our Cabs if I remember right and Phil sent me an email after the show offering to take our wines in to show a local retailer friend of his.
I never met Dustin Buchko. At least he didn’t introduce himself to me, he was just one of about a dozen people who took long and serious notes. He gave our wines great scores, 92+ for the Eaglepoint Ranch Syrah, 92 for the Uvas Creek Cabernet and 93 for the Santa Cruz Mountains Cabernet. I also think he took great notes, consistent with how I describe the wines. He also pointed out the floral noses on our wines. That’s something I’ve very proud of and I work hard to get. I love that in a wine I drink and really want our wines to have that quality.
A thread like that can mean 10-12 new sign ups for us if people keep posting on it and commenting. I just know that from experience. 10-12 new people willing to try our wine is huge for us. That’s exactly the connection we’re after.
I have one diversion about our dinner date in Pasadena before heading home the next morning. We walked the neighborhood by the hotel and decided on a tapas bar called BarCelona, clever name, good food. Sat at the bar and quickly figured out it was amateur night…pretty much anyone who just turned 21 or 22 was out on the town hitting all the bars for St. Patty’s Day.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that, I simply don’t recall putting on the green to go bar hopping on a Tuesday night ever.
And it was fun, everyone was having a great time, Paul and I were sucking down some suds and tapas and catching up on the very long day at the show. Then we got a surprise! A very loud surprise. A kilt-wearing-bagpipe-blowing group of musician people marched into the bar and played 3 sets of gawdawful “music”. It was ear piercingly loud and horrendous. I’m getting too old for this bar stuff aren’t I? Nah, it was bagpipes, you can totally relate, right???!!!
Anyway, next morning we got out of town early, 8:30-ish and got on the road.
Pasadena and the surrounding area is pretty nice, the view of the mountains was incredible and we had no traffic as we left town. There was significant stop and go traffic on the other side of the freeway headed toward Ventura and I was glad I wasn’t in it this time.
After The Grapevine, as we headed off the mountain, there was a field full of purple flowers to our left and I could make out the snow capped peaks of the sierra’s to my right. There was some overcast haze, looked like residual fog that was clouding the sky, but not too bad. The air quality was definitely a topic of conversation for the entire trip.
I thought I might knit while Paul was driving, but ended up goofing around with both our ipods. I love the new iphone, it’s slick. I was able to pull up our route on the google maps and got it to link in to our mobile location. After toying around with that I put it away when I realized I could check email too, but decided not to risk being geeked again. So I sat quietly and looked out at the landscape instead.
There was a rancher rounding up the rams with his pick up truck – don’t cowboys ride horses anymore? And we saw a dead and bloated cow in a field. It reminded me of when I lived in Hayward years ago. There was a ranch on Mission Blvd. that had a sign saying they did Livestock Transportation and Deadstock Removal.
I did see a bee-keeper dude today too. He was all beekeeper’ed up in his suit and moving the boxes. As the windshield became more and more splattered with bug guts I wondered if the pollen gatherers binge during bloom time. Some of the splatters were so yellow I had to figure that there was some big time bingeing going on. Or they were yellow bugs (?).
That just about wraps up the road trip part of our travels – I didn’t take any pictures, they would have been thru the windshield and it was pretty gross.
The Pasadena — SJ section was just 5 hours and 8 minutes, not sure of the mileage…Paul wrote it down somewhere.
Pauls version of our trip was lacking in details – other than pointing out that the highlight of the drive down to San Diego was the rest stop on I-5. Let me provide some more color and romance.
Things he failed to mention about the trip south:
We passed Famous Daves BBQ, where a recent food reviewer said: “I don’t really believe vegetarianism has a place in modern society, much like communism or the recent films of George Lucas. Anyway, it’s a barbecue place.” I’m pretty sure we’ll go eat there one day.
Right before the turn that takes us up and over Pacheco Pass I was mid-sentence about something and did not stop and blurt out “Look! A goat!”. I’m easily distracted and since I’m a Capricorn I totally dig on goats. It was looking at the cow in the shared space with it with disdain, I’m pretty sure he was about to put his horns down and ram the back end of the cow just for the heck of it.
Did you know that Casa de Fruta has a Pick and Pull? No kidding, they have everything!! Petting zoo, train rides, wine tasting, cup flipping…pick and pull. Ok, I made that last part up, but it’s been about 20 years since the last time I passed by there and I do not recall there being rusted out, dilapidated, worn farm/other equipment lining the perimeter of the property up by the RV park. “Cool”.
Alongside the road to our left as we made our way up to the reservoir a coyote was trekking by. He looked like he was having a pretty cool morning jog.
We peaked and rounded the bend where you get the first glimpse of the reservoir and yep, it’s pretty low. Not like I remember it from the early 90’s at all. Still impressive and when we got around the bend and started south I got a great view of the bright blue sky and deep blue reflection of the water and our now vibrant green hillsides behind it all. I actually wondered if the hills would be brown by the time we drove back, it seems like it happens overnight.
Paul admitted having camped at the other side of the dam, I asked him why, “was the water treatment plant all booked up?”. It’s bleak, and ugly, unless you really dig on fantastically huge power lines, and lots of them, surrounding the landscape. He had found out about some different compound bow brands and wanted to try out his new bow.
Highlights on the drive south on I-5 were the numerous orchards in bloom. To my right all white blossoms, many of them dropped leaving the ground between the rows blanketed in white, very pretty. On the left, some new trees blooming in bright pink, they were so small compared to the mature orchard.
We passed some grape vines that were like none I’ve seen before. I’ve heard about and seen pictures, but never really saw them in person until this trip. So bizarre to see them trained for mechanical processing. Paul pointed out another vineyard that was on a different trellis, but mechanically pruned. They looked wiry, like a crazy old womans head of hair. Frizzy and out of control.
I watched a crop duster do laps across a plot of land. On the west bound pass he had a sharp uplift to avoid power lines, but as he came back across toward the east side, he had a long leisurely ride before swinging back around. When I was a kid I had always thought that would be a great job, I had loved flying with my dad so much that it appealed to me.
We passed a poop farm. I mean dairy. Happy cows definitely do not live on a dairy or stock yard. How could any living thing enjoy being surrounded by that much methane? Whoooweeee. Ripe.
There were some other luckier cows on another plot of land roaming around at their leisure and I’m pretty sure they were feeling a lot happier about life.
Oh, and sheep. It’s lamb season! Yahooo. I asked Paul what our upcoming plans are for this weekend and he said we’re free. Fantastic, I’m going to rotisserie a leg of lamb! And just up ahead on the road, the next agriculture was citrus trees. Lamb marinated in lemon and lime juice (and garlic and rosemary if you really want to know).
Bla Bla Bla, over the Grapevine, bla bla bla, LA BASIN. Oh wow. Yuck. We decided to take 5 all the way to San Diego. I’m certain the locals down south will tell us 50 different ways that are better that we could have taken, but after 5 hours of road time, the fewer interchanges to navigate the better.
It wasn’t too bad. Mostly I was discouraged by how grubby it was. The air quality was the pits, turgid doesn’t begin to express it. There were sections were I could see there was some really cool architecture and history, but it’s been developed all around so haphazardly that it’s lost any charm it may have once had.
Some of the new freeway sound walls were so fancy that I was wondering where the money came from to pay for it. I mean really, there were sections with these artfully crafted painted squares that were inset along the concrete. Like, why bother I wondered…but that’s the cynic in me. I’m glad there is some beautification plans in the works. It caught my eye.
We didn’t actually go all the way in to San Diego, we were staying in Del Mar, about 25 miles north of SD. It was gorgeous.
And that was Part I of Road Tripping: SJ — SD, mileage count forgotten, but 7 hours almost to the minute, not bad….
Stefania said that as we walked up to our hotel room in Pasadena tonight. We had just wrapped up the Trade Only show at the convention center a few minutes before. The show was ok, but for us it was really slow.
The crowd is about a 50/50 mix of people. Half are people who work at restaurants or distributors and have been given the tickets by their employers as comps. They treat it like a party and a chance for some free booze. The other half are big brokers and distributors and they mostly wander around to wineries who sell through Safeway or Von’s and try and steal business from each other.
Leaves us with not a lot to do. I took the picture below of a winery across from us. It was so slow for them I actually caught them both checking their email.
And this is why it’s slow. These old coots are lined up at a winery with a popular $15 supermarket wine. They taste through the line up of higher end stuff and try and impress each other with the latest pallet they’ve moved. Pretty boring stuff. I can’t see these guys helping us sell wine. They wouldn’t be able to pick out an up and coming winery if it fell on them.
In fact they are so out of touch when this famous character came shooting by they didn’t even stop to take a double take. That’s Gary Pisoni. He stopped to try our Eaglepoint Ranch Syrah, and quickly wrote down our name and gave the glass to his significant other. “Wow, really good”, and then he was off.
I had wanted to do a little bit about people with note books at trade shows, but that didn’t come together today. Look for that tomorrow, but basically, show up and take notes at my table, and you’ll get 100% of my attention.
As for today, it was a tough day at the day job. We were stuck for a big part of the day at the hotel as I tried to get emails, voicemails and conference calls done.
On the way down to San Diego we passed a lot of places that I remember from business trips in the past. Hotels and convention centers that were familiar and brought back lots of memories. Some of them going back to my days in college working on political campaigns.
On all those trips, probably in the hundreds now after 25 years of business travel, I can’t ever remember standing out. I was always just another ‘Dilbert’ or ‘Pointy Haired Boss’ in the crowd of travelers. This trip though, as we’ve been stuck in the hotel a bit, I’ve had a much different experience.
When I’m usually on business, my job is hard to explain. I’ve always worked for medium or small size high tech companies that most people would have never heard of, doing things that are hard to explain on products that most people will never see, touch or know about. The front desk, the valet, the bartender, they all ask what you do. You try and explain, pitifully, and you can see their head click off: “oh another Dilbert.”
So now I say: “Winemaker”. “Oh, wow, really? Why are you in town?”. Something different, something that hasn’t been in a Dilbert cartoon. And they remember. At the bar, in the restaurant, at the valet, at the front desk, everyone has remembered who we are and what we do. A totally unique experience for me. We joke a lot about the ‘celebrity winemaker’, mostly when we make our friend Kathy drive us somewhere and I sit in the back of her fancy BMW, but there really is something a little celebrity about it. At least in that people remember you and what you do.
It’s cool to have a job like that. One people know right away and understand what you make. It’s easy to relate to and easy to talk about. For me that’s a great thing in the job. At least on a few trips a year now, I’m not Dilbert.
We’re back at the hotel now after a fun day at the trade show. I’ll have some more thoughts tomorrow, but wanted to get up a few pictures and links:
Today we poured three wines:
2007 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch, Mendocino County
2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Uvas Creek Vineyard
2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Santa Cruz Mountains
For everyone we talked with you can sign up on our mailing list at:
http://localhost/wordpress/contactus/list.html
For us the highlight was the public session. We had maybe two dozen people stop by who have been following our blogs or posts and that was very cool. We enjoyed meeting all of you. We also got the chance to meet many new people, and we really love the chance to talk about our wine and our story with people.
The day started with a shoe ware emergency. Stefania didn’t think her tennis shoes would hold up so we stopped to get her a pair of slip ons at a near by shop.
I got the shirt on our last trip to New Orleans. It’s my ‘official’ trade show shirt.
This was the show just starting as it opened to the trade at 1 PM
When we arrived back at the hotel Stef grabbed her knitting and we stopped by the bar to relax for a bit before dinner. That’s my Manhattan.
We’ve had a very nice stay here at the Marriott in Del Mar. One really cool thing about making wine is people remember your job and the entire staff has been following our progress and asking us how things are going. For you serious wine geeks, the restaurant here has a very nice wine list with some great gems on the list. We meet the wine manager last night and chatted about his great list.