Wednesday, April 1

napa: journey to french laundry

blue sky + clouds
ok, i have to take a break from my beijing posts. it is obvious to me at this point that it will take me forever, so i need to move on with my life.

in march, destructor and i went with some friends to napa to achieve our ultimate life goal: EAT AT THE FRENCH LAUNDRY. we lucked out with reservations (more on that later) and snagged a table for 4 on a sunday at 5:30pm, right when their dinner service opens.

so, what to do with the rest of the day? go wine tasting in napa of course! (saturday was spent in san francisco at a hotel with horrible customer service but we did eat a burma superstar which will be posted later)

our first stop sunday morning was artesa winery. it was a beautiful sunny day, even though the weather forecast had said it was going to be cloudy and rainy. lies! we arrived right before 10am, when the winery opens. on the side of the road by the entrance, there was a flock of sheep just hanging out. i squealed and we stopped the car. they were so adorable. we all got out of the car for the photo op.

we are all grazing
we are eating grass
my friend kept saying, "this is what i want to eat for dinner. mmm." how?? look at them!

once we all finally left the sheep and made it inside the artesa property, we were stunned by the gorgeous landscape.

beautiful water at artesa
artesa view
sculpture
the artesa property is truly amazing. not only that, but the views were breathtaking. of course, drinking wine at 11 in the morning is always nice. the tasting was pretty good and the people were great, but my favorite part is definitely the landscape.

gorgeous views from artesa
sky + bird

rosemary
we found lots of fresh herb plants around the property too. mainly, a lot of rosemary which we wished we could have taken.

see the rest of the artesa photos here.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

beautiful photo's, seriously it doesn't look real.
so glad we got to hear this story in person.

shoe monster said...

thank you! i need to finish posting about the rest of that day and of course FRENCH LAUNDRY dinner - watch for it =]

Marie said...

Really lovely photos. They reminded me that as much as I've been pining to travel to other parts of the US as well as abroad, there's still plenty to see in CA! I still haven't been to Napa, which is a travesty. And I never would've guessed that was rosemary, I was too distracted by the pretty blue flowers!

shoe monster said...

@ marie - thank you! i have a ton more of napa photos coming up so stay tuned (and pics from the French Laundry in Yountville). i love your blog - i myself am a lover of pasta and rice =]