Wine and Sex Kittens - March 4th

Our first wine tasting took place in the vineyards in the Arollo Grande area. We had been slightly disappointed with the Tolosa pinot noir we had had at dinner and were searching for the finest that California had to offer, straight from the growers. Our first stop was at a place called Bailyana where we paid out 4 dollars each and made our way to the tasting counter with the hoards. The set wines we were given to taste were ultra sweet and fairly characterless chardonnays. I asked to try something that wasn’t on the list (a sauvignon blanc) and that was a bit better. It made us realize that the coach loads of tasters are simply given the cheap rubbish to try. The second winery was called Talley’s where we had a reasonable chardonnay, but a pinot so dodgy that I actually gagged on it. We read the tasting notes and it read “fruits and cola favors”. Imagine serving that!? It was a beautiful tasting room however and the pourer was very friendly. When he found out that David was Irish, he introduced us to another Irish lady; a tiny sozzled blonde woman called Margaret. She was wearing a cardboard tiara with “Sex Kitten” written on it. Margaret yelled across at us “If I told you I was a sex kitten, would you disown me?” Not stopping to wait for the reply she came over and talked to us. She only had a trace of an Irish accent as she had lived in Las Vegas since 1968. She was on a hen weekend: we had stumbled on California’s answer to Temple Bar. Groups hire limos and are taken around the vineyards in them. What a good idea. We had our own patient driver – George, bless him.

The third stop of the vine trip was at a place called Letitia, famous for its sparkling wines. They were pretty good and we even bought an orange Muscat dessert wine. Not a bad first day.