Napa: May 16, 2012 (300 Level)

May 16, 2012 Itinerary
(Napa)

Number of wineries: 9!
Average rating: 4.23
Wine Route Rating: Advanced (300)
Highlight of the day: Hartwell (4.69) was very good, but Vineyard 29 (4.88) was outstanding and an instant favorite.

Notes: To say this was a full day of tasting was an understatement! Nine is certainly too many in a day, and my palate was murky for the last two stops (at least). That being said, there were some stellar stops along the way before we got to the end. Given the high number of stops and the need for appointments at about half the stops, this one gets a 300-level rating.

	Location	Start Time	Stop Time	Reservation?	Notes
	Soda Canyon Store (4.38)	9:40	9:55	Not Needed	It's a recurring theme: starting the day by picking up lunch for a picnic later
	Quixote (4.19)	10:00	10:45		The wine is decent here, but pricey and truth be told most people stop for the bizarre architectural design from Friedensreich Hundertwasser.
	Regusci (4.13)	10:50	11:25	Not Needed	A quick fill-in when I finished early at Quixote, Regusci was good but failed slightly to meet expectations
	Hartwell (4.69)	11:30	12:30		Expectations definitely exceeded here, both in terms of quality of the wine, the facility, and the structure of the tasting.
	Vineyard 29 (4.88)	1:00	2:15		Fantastic experience -- great wines and a completely professionally run tasting.
	Twomey (3.75)	2:25	2:45	Not Needed	Better wine and better tasting experiences exist
	Madrigal (4.38)	3:00	3:45		A friendly stop with plenty of wine to try
	Rutherford Grove (3.94)	4:00	4:30	Not Needed	A responsible taster would have stopped after Madrigal, but this wasn't a responsible day. So-so stop along Hwy 29
	Whitehall Lane (4.06)	4:35	5:00	Not Needed	Raucous atmosphere at the end of the day here
	Hall St. Helena (4.06)	5:10	5:30	Not Needed	Friendlier than they had to be for an end-of-the-day tasting
	Press (4.63)	6:00	7:00		Cole's Chop House in downtown Napa seems to get more press, but if you're in the mood for steak, my meal here was far superior

Route:

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Map:

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Sequoia Grove (4.19)

http://www.sequoiagrove.com/

Open: 10:30am-5:00pm

Appt required? Only for parties of 6 or more

Last barlinwine.com visit: 2012 (May 17, 2012 Itinerary)

Directions:

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Tasting:

I headed north on Hwy 29 from my tasting at Paradigm and stopped next at Sequoia Grove. In a valley planted mostly with vines and few trees, it’s certainly odd to pull up to winery and see it flanked by massive sequoias, but that’s what you get at Sequoia Grove. They don’t get any extra points for name originality, but I care more about the wine than the name, so it was time to get down to business.

On the day I was there, Sequoia Grove offered two tastings: a “Current Release Tasting” for $15 that featured their 2010 Chardonnay, 2009 “Rebellious Red”, 2009 Stagecoach Vineyard Syrah, and 2009 Napa Valley Cabernet. I wouldn’t find out how these wines were, or what made the Red “Rebellious”, because they also offered a "Single Vineyard Tasting" featuring 3 single vineyard Cabernets for $30. All three wines were 2007 and came from the Lamoreaux, Stagecoach, and Morisoli vineyards.

My host presented a nice large Cabernet glass (I’m a big fan of proper stemware for tasting) and poured me my first Cabernet, the Lamoreaux Vineyard. I took a sip and said, “Hmmm…is this the 2007 or the 2008?”

“Oh, excuse me! That’s the 2008! Let me get you another glass so you can try the 2007 side-by-side.”

Now, I’m no wine palate genius…I just happened to catch a glimpse of the label from the first pour. But what the tasting room didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.

It was about this time that the guy next to me perked up (he's in the black t-shrt on the right in case you couldn't guess). “You seem to know a lot about wine,” he said. “I’m just out here killing time until I fly my client back to Texas.” He was a pilot from Missouri and worked exclusively flying a very wealthy Texan around in his private plane, and he made the rest of the visit pretty darn interesting. He knew almost nothing about wine, but he loved to pepper the pourer with questions like “What’s the difference between a Sauvignon Blanc and a Chardonnay?” and “What’s the difference between a Port and a dessert wine?”

After my side-by-side of the’07 and ’08 Lamoreaux, both of which were very good, I moved next to the 2007 Stagecoach Cabernet, another solid effort, before finishing with the 2007 Morisoli, the tightest wine of the bunch and my least favorite. The running commentary kept me entertained and the wine was good enough that I was interested in picking a favorite bottle to travel home with me. Then my new pilot asked my favorite question:

“Is that Opus One right next door? I may go check them out next.”

The guy pouring the wine just kind of laughed, as did I, and we wrapped up our tastings at the same time, with a bottle of the 2007 Lamoreaux heading to my shipper box in the car. I don’t know if the pilot made it to Opus One, but I wished him well as he headed to his car and I went to scout out the eponymous grove and take a few pictures (they have a nice picnic area if you're interested). Plus, I still had more wineries to hit! Next up: St. Supery.

Recommended wine: The Lamoreaux and the Stagecoach were my two favorites, with my mistakenly poured *2008* Lamoreaux surprisingly edging out as the winner.

Ratings (out of 5):

WINE	4.25	TASTING ROOM	4.50
ATMOSPHERE	4.25	VALUE	3.75
OVERALL		4.19

Paradigm (4.44)

http://www.paradigmwinery.com/

Open: 10:00am-4:00pm

Appt required? Yes

Last barlinwine.com visit: 2012 (May 17, 2012 Itinerary)

Directions:

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Tasting:

When I found out Heidi Barrett has been the consulting winemaker at Paradigm for the last twenty years, I made it a priority to stop there on my next trip to Napa. Heidi made her name at Screaming Eagle, but I first tried a Heidi wine at Lamborn Family and immediately understood the hype. There is a different structure and style to a Heidi Barrett wine, and after seeing how she worked with Howell Mountain fruit, I was curious to see what she’d do with grapes from the Napa Valley floor.

I arrived on time for my 1pm tasting and met Diane who would be running the tasting. She let me know there was a group that would be joining us and we’d give them a few minutes. We killed time making small talk and eventually went on a walking tour of the facility. I met office manager Ann Trimpe and winery owner Ren Harris. Somewhere around 1:30 the other folks finally showed up and we were able to get started.

The tasting was set up in the small foyer of the winery. The wines we were to try were displayed on a table and we were each presented with a glass. Diane started us with a Rose, which tasted especially nice on a warm May day on the valley floor. We followed this with a splash of Merlot and a splash of Cab Franc, but all of those were just appetizers. The meat of the tasting was consecutive pours of 2005-2008 Cabernet. All were available to purchase, and all were quite tasty, with 2007 and 2008 emerging as close favorites for me.

Only thing that may have improved the tasting would have been the opportunity to try all of those Cabs side-by-side. Diane was more than happy to pour me a quick splash of the 2007 again while I still had the 2008 fresh on my palate, but I would have loved to be able to try all four wines against each other even more than I did. Other than that small improvement, this was definitely a good stop. Friendly people and very good wine at a fair price makes Paradigm a place I’d recommend and one I will likely be back to in the near future.

Recommended wine: All of the wines were good and worth a purchase, but the 2007 Cab edged out the 2008 as my favorite wine of the stop.

Ratings (out of 5):

WINE	4.50	TASTING ROOM	4.25
ATMOSPHERE	4.50	VALUE	4.50
OVERALL		4.44

Hall St. Helena (4.06)

http://www.hallwines.com

Open: 10:00am-5:30pm. Note that Hall has 2 locations: this location in St. Helena on Hwy 29 (open 10-5:30), and the Rutherford location east of Silverado Trail that is open by appointment only.

Appt required? No

Last barlinwine.com visit: 2012 (May 16, 2012 Itinerary)

Directions:

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Tasting:

I’m sure most tasting room employees roll their eyes when visitors stumble in 20 minutes before closing. To the credit of the folks at Hall, I didn’t see any eye rolls, but I also may have been too tipsy to notice.

As the last stop on a whopping 9-stop day (albeit one where the dump bucket got plenty of use), I will not pretend to have an authoritative take on the wine but I’ll do my best. Hall offers two lines of wine: the “Napa Valley Collection” which are the widely distributed versions of their Sauvignon Blanc, Merlot, Cabernet, and “Kathryn Hall” Cabernet, and the “Artisan Collection” which are winery exclusives. They have tastings geared toward each collection, and since I don’t fly to California to try and buy wine I can pick up at Binny’s in Chicago, I elected to do the Artisan tasting.

The tasting started with the “T Bar T Ranch” Sauvignon Blanc, which in customary fashion I elected to skip. Instead I started with the 2008 “Napa River Ranch” Merlot. I thought this wine was just okay and pretty tight still. I dumped most of it and moved to the 2008 “Darwin” Proprietary Red blend. This wine, which was 95% Syrah in 2008, was pretty good and a step up from the Merlot. My host moved to a bonus wine from the standard tasting next, the 2009 Napa Valley Cabernet. Not good, and I think it was poured to make the following wine, the 2009 “Jack’s Masterpiece” Cabernet stand out more. It did stand out, but it wasn’t amazing. The best wine of the visit turned out to be the final wine, the 2009 Napa Valley Malbec. I always enjoy a good Malbec, and with the rise in prominence of Argentinian Malbec in the past several years we’re beginning to see more of this bottled on its own in Napa. While not as good as some of the better Napa Malbecs I’ve had (Hope & Grace comes to mind), this was still a good effort and I took a bottle with me.

Overall, this was a decent tasting and a nice room. I’ll look to return earlier in the day at some point (or try Hall’s more exclusive Rutherford tasting room) on a future visit.

Recommended wine: I enjoyed the Malbec at my tasting and again later when we brought a bottle of it to Mustard's Grill.

Ratings (out of 5):

WINE	4.00	TASTING ROOM	4.00
ATMOSPHERE	4.25	VALUE	4.00
OVERALL		4.06