My cousin from San Francisco was coming to town last weekend, so I brainstormed a list of places I could take her that would be different from her haunts in the City. After all, Sacramento does have its own unique charm—if you look for it. Among other things, Sacramento has a lot of great local wineries perfect for wine tasting Sacramento in some really neat places. For example, I recently discovered the Old Sugar Mill in Clarksburg after doing a half marathon there. It’s like Napa, but has a decidedly more country feel. It’s charming and quaint—perfect to bring my city slicker cousin to.
We ended up making a day of it, nearly driving the entire way near the river. We actually had lunch at Swabbies on the river and made our way to the Delta. It was a perfect day to be on the Delta and an even more perfect fall day to go wine tasting. My cousin may have the City at her fingertips, but I was showing her something she didn’t get to see all the time. And that’s why I love Sacramento, you can go from the grit of downtown to the country in a matter of minutes.
When we got to the Old Sugar Mill, we took a walk around to take some pictures of the pretty fall leaves and the colors changing everywhere. It was just gorgeous. After we got all the photos we wanted, we went inside for some wine tasting. The first thing we saw when we walked in was someone sampling olive oil and balsamic vinegar. We were a little hungry, and we never turn down free food, so we tried some and IT WAS DELICIOUS! Sure, we were hungry, but we were pretty sure it would have been awesome even if we weren’t desperate for food at the time we tried it. Once we had the oil-soaked bread in us, we were ready for wine.
As it turned out, the people who were handing out olive oil where a part of one of the wineries called Rendezvous Winery. I didn’t remember them from the time I went to Old Sugar Mill before, but they said they had only been around for about a year. We went in and decided to taste some of their wines, and we ended up hanging out there for the rest of the afternoon. We talked to the winemaker who used to make wines in Napa, but has moved his passion to the Sacramento region. He was very friendly and talked us through the wine making process as well as introduced us to each of the wines we tried. By the end of the afternoon, we had nearly run out of time. So instead of tasting more wine, we just wore off our buzz by walking around the grounds again.
We had such a great day with Rendez-vous and my cousin and I have agreed to make wine tasting at the Old Sugar Mill a tradition. Only, we promised each other we would try to go to other wineries next time.
For years, my wife and I talked about remodeling the kitchen. We knew exactly which appliances we wanted and where we wanted them. We knew what kind of countertops we wanted and what they were going to look like. We virtually had it planned out. The only thing we didn’t have until recently was the funding. But finally, after fifteen years of dreaming about our kitchen remodel, we finally have our new kitchen. And we have