I awoke much too early for sunlight this past Tuesday and sleepily slumped into my car for the drive to Napa. I prepared myself for the long stretch of I-5 that awaited me. Some tunes, water, snacks and my excitement for a week with some of America’s finest wine writers and professionals. Passing through the flat lands north of Los Angeles and a sea of clustered cattle and their oppressive stench, I pressed my foot to the pedal with heaviness. Living on the edge of limits of speed, the wind collided with the seams of my little Cabrio creating a kind of loud, whistling air cocoon. I increased the volume of my radio to deafening proportions and carried on along the monotony of asphalt with dozens of new trucker travel companions. 6 hours later, through lingering fog and foggy eyes, I began to see the light. The light of the Napa Valley.
Charming towns. Idyllic, even. Signs for Zinfandel Lane and Vintage Road. Perfectly manicured lawns, landscapes and cookie cutter shops on main streets. Palatial tasting rooms and large iron-gated wineries complete with fountains. Mondavi, Cakebread, Stag’s Leap, Opus 1, Krug, Terlato. Success, money and luxury seem to be the words screaming from the sides of Highway 29. Not like the type of wine country I am used to. But as I continue on past Napa and Yountville towards St Helena and Calistoga, the beauty of the land is shouting as well. The vineyards are almost too perfect. Even in winter.
Endless patches of wild mustard blossoms fill in the gaps between the bare vines- a bumble bee flitting by alongside my car. The land seemed to echo my notions of Napa and its wine. A little too manicured and softened; a missing puzzle piece of substance and soul. But, what did I really know? I haven’t had the opportunity to drink much of Napa’s finest. This week, however, would change all of that…
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I began to write this in response to Day 1 of the Wine Writer Symposium. Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan Sun, was our keynote speaker. She is a charming and eloquent Georgia lady with an intense love of Italy. A fellow Southerner with inexplicable ties to Italia. She spoke to us on that day about writing with a sense of place, something she does so terribly well in her novels. I thought I would begin my series of posts from this fabulous week with that in mind.
Coming up: Tasting Notes 101 with Eric Asimov of the NY Times, Crash Course in Wine Faults (and I thought the cows on I-5 were bad), a trip to the Culinary Institute of America and the chardonnay/cabernet sauvignon vertical blind tasting of Premier Napa.
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