Caravan Phase 2 complete

September 21, 2009
Napa, CA

As always, click on a picture to enlarge it. I've put links to the blog for the caravan on each day, as well.

We relocated today to the Napa Valley Expo, right in the heart of the city of Napa, gateway to the Napa Valley. Can you tell I'm excited to be here?

Before we get into Napa, let me recap the last few days of our journey, focusing on the Sacramento area, including the surrounding counties.

We started Wednesday with a nice drive (even counting the road conditions on I-80 and the heat) from Truckee down to Sacramento. We're staying at the CalExpo RV Park, where Geri and I stopped a week ago while we dropped off the Range Rover for repairs. With a much easier site to get into, we were soon parked and hooked up. The 50 amp power circuits were getting a workout, as temperatures have soared into the upper 90s. After a briefing on the area from a representative of the tourism association, we were off in our carpools to Plymouth, CA, for a wonderful dinner at Taste, one of the top restaurants in the area. We had a great meal (I had beef and Geri had prawns, and both paired nicely with a local Sangiovese), which will be hard to top on the rest of the trip.

Thursday was devoted to a motor coach tour which took us to two wineries, plus a restored country store for lunch. Our first stop, though, was at a farm for retired alpacas, where we learned the difference between them and llamas (llamas are bigger) and got a chance to meet them up close. The first winery, Latcham, specializes in Zinfandel, and they have numerous awards to show for their efforts. The other winery was Bogle, which produces a huge amount of wine each year including a Petit Syrah that we like.

The focus of Friday's ( and part 2) activities was on Sacramento itself. This was a reminder to "stop and smell the roses" - we've been through Sacramento on I-5 and/or I-80 several times but never stopped. This was a chance to catch up on what we'd missed. We started with a walking tour of Old Sacramento (good thing it was early, given the heat) and learned about the city's history and how it served as a major transportation hub for both water and rail. As short shuttle bus ride away, we had a guided tour of the state capitol (no, we didn't see the Govinator), followed by lunch at Fat's, an "Old Sac" institution. From there, many of us toured - and enjoyed - the California State Railroad Museum (did you know then Sacramento was the western terminus of the first transcontinental railroad?) before we all headed for the Sacramento River Train sunset/dinner excursion. Even though the sun set earlier than we'd have liked, a good time was had by all.

Saturday started with a carpool ride out to Grass Valley, where we toured the Empire Mine and had a lunch of pasties (pronounced past'-ee, thank you very much, first made in the area by Cornish miners). In addition to the gold mine itself, closed for years and donated to the State for a park, we had a chance to tour the original owner's "cottage" - assuming that label can describe an 8,000 square foot English -style country house set on 13 acres with formal gardens and a reflecting pool. From the mine, we carpooled to the nearby Pilot Peak Winery, where we watched some grapes being crushed and de-stemmed and had an extremely entertaining tasting emceed by one of the owners. Since we wanted to get back to let the pups out, we had dinner with Bud and Suzie Walsh, one of the other couples on the caravan who are "dog people", near the RV Park. We went to a place called "Tex Wasabi's", owned by Guy Fieri of the Food Network, which was interesting (as in BBQ meets sushi).

Sunday was our free day and we took full advantage of the opportunity to sleep late and catch up on stuff around the coach. Today, we lined up and made the short ~60 mile trek from Sacramento to Napa. Another beautiful day for driving, and a nice surprise with the quality of the park at Napa Expo: all concrete pads and lots of grassy space between sites. We'll definitely try to stay here on our next visit.