Where am I Wednesday

Napa Valley, California.

Who goes to Napa Valley without drinking wine? Well, not I, but I can tell you there are plenty of activities to keep you busy if you don’t plan on having double vision by the end of the day.

Bike riding and hot air ballooning are two of the more popular options. There are plenty of bike rental companies and the views from a balloon are amazing if the weather cooperates. With that said, we did not do either of these activities. We decided on a long weekend in our travel trailer with our dog Maximus.

We started with a tour of the Old Faithful Geyser. Including my AAA discount it was $9.00 per person. It is one of those things that once you have done it, you don’t need to do it again. I was a little disappointed and thought it was pricey for sitting at a picnic table in the hot dirty area watching a little tiny pond with a few rocks in it. We did see the geyser erupt twice while we were there and the video and pictures turned out nice, but I would not pay $9 to do it again.

Maybe a little more scenic was the Petrified Forest. There is a 10% discount on line so this was also $9.00 per person. Still a little expensive, but Napa is not cheap so I guess it fell in line with the rest of the town.

Another favorite activity is just driving through the towns and stopping at all of the little shops wineries just for the scenery.  Two of our favorite things to buy in Napa is olive oil and vinegar.

Our three favorite places that we ate at were Gotts Roadside and Silverado Brewing Company and Rutherford Grill. All three offered outdoor seating and were welcome to serving Max. Gotts Roadside is a great place for a cheap burger and milkshake. They have a fairly large and inexpensive menu (less than $10) with a great shady park-like setting to eat at behind the building. The Silverado Brewing Company had a wonderful lunch menu and great beer. The prices seemed to be in the $10 - $15 range for lunch. The Rutherford Grill was the most expensive place we ate at costing $15 - $20 for each lunch, but they did offer Max a take home bone that still had tons of meat on it for free.

Every winery that we went to was dog friendly. At the Franciscan, we sat out on a beautiful patio and we were served our wine tastings right at our table. At St. Supery and Peju, Max was welcomed in and we enjoyed our tastings at the bar – Max enjoyed all of the attention and treats from passer-bys.