This Photo is a Preview of This Week’s Destination Discovery. Can you identify what city it’s near near
This postcard perfect destination is near a cruise ship port.
Hints:
What is the town? Be the first to post your answer in comments. Or learn more in Wednesday’s post.
Flight delay? Tasting wine flights at Vino Volo wine bar in Washington Dulles airport.
1. Bacchus Wine and Saki Bar, San Francisco
Located on the Hyde Street cable car route near the top of Russian hill, this intimate neighborhood wine bar is the ideal place to wait for table at nearby restaurants like Zarzuela or Sushi Groove. Wines by the glass or bottle, wine flights, select beers and sake are all on the menu, served in a small room filled with comfy seats, pleasant music, engaging art, fresh flowers and a friendly personality behind the bar, often the owner.
2. W.I.N.O. Wine Institute of New Orleans
We stumbled onto this unusual wine bar/ store when in New Orleans walking to dinner at Emeril’s restaurant. You provide a credit card to receive a tasting card and glasses, and then insert the card into an Enomatic wine serving system where you taste by the ounce or ounces. Your card keeps track of your bill. W.I.N.O. offers 120 different wines to sample by the ounce, half glass or glass. Good thing our dinner reservations kept us from getting carried away.
3. JP Wine Bar, Kansas City
While it’s called a wine bar and coffee house, JP’s is really about fine-dining food like coffee crusted beef tenderloin salad, wild mushroom risotto and diver sea scallops, served as large or small plates or sides. We like to order a mix of plates and sides, along with a cheese flight for sharing while trying a few of the 22 different wine flights. If we find a wine we like, we order a full glass or a bottle – the list includes more 250 bottles from around the world. Not many wine bars served Rafanelli Zinfandel in a wine flight; this one does. One note, it’s pricy by Kansas City standards. See full menu and wine list here
4. Zinc Wine Bar & Bistro Albuquerque, New Mexico
Fodor’s lead us to this wine bar and restaurant in Albuquerque. We stayed at the zinc top bar, enjoying the opportunity to make our own flights from the extensive wine list. We also liked the choices: ½ glasses, glass, ½ bottle and bottle. The dining room looked great, but if we were going for dinner we’d want to sit at the open kitchen dining bar.
5. The Hidden Vine, San Francisco
While seeking directions to a new wine bar that turned out not open, the concierge at the Hilton Union Square introduced us to this wine bar, drawing us a map to its “hidden” location. It’s now a mandatory stop on every San Francisco visit. Hidden in the back of the lobby of the Fitzgerald Hotel, it is dark and cozy with 35 unusual wines generally from small producers. We like the taste comparison flights that include two different wines of the same variety or type – with little labels so their “identities” are hidden until you’ve decided which you like the best. The food offerings, limited to cheese and charcuterie, have always been fabulous.
6. Vino Volo in 10 US airports from Seattle to Baltimore
We spend lots of time in flying, which leads to layovers and flight delays in airports. We don’t mind so much if there is a Vino Volo wine bar near our gate, like there is Washington Dulles Concourse C (United flights) or in Baltimore’s Concourse A (Southwest flights). Very personable staff, great wines, and the brie and prosciutto sandwich always hits the spot. Vino Volo features a wine comparison tool that rates wines by fruit and complexity – see here. If you are connecting to your last flight, you can buy wine to go buy the bottle, and surprise someone when you arrive.
We enjoy wine and exploring the world’s wine-producing regions. Tasting one’s way around the world in a good wine bar is another enjoyable way to travel. What is your favorite wine bar? We’d like to check it out. Please share in comments.
Other wine posts that you might enjoy:
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The Polar Ice Cap viewed from the deck of the Prisendam
Cruising at the Top of the World onboard the ms Prinsendam
People often ask us about our favorite port during our 130-day European adventure in 2007. A tough question, because it’s difficult to compare Europe’s diverse ports. Venice, Sochi, and Leknes, in Norway’s Lofoten Islands, are just a few examples. We enjoyed them all – for very different reasons – making it hard to choose one favorite. But ask us about our most unique European scenic cruising experience, and we have a quick answer: sailing into the Polar Ice Cap onboard the Prinsendam.
What’s the Polar Ice Cap?
The earth’s North Pole is covered by sea ice or pack ice floating over the Arctic Ocean. If you look closely at National Geographic’s “The World” map, it contains an indication of “the winter extent of sea ice” near both poles. Each year during July and August, some of this ice pack melts, shrinking the solid mass of ice cap. Between the frozen mass and the open sea is a section of the Arctic Ocean with pieces of sea ice floating on the water’s surface. To us, it is “chunky”, like ice cubes in a cocktail.
Captain Turner (red jacket) and a junior officer navigate the Prinsendam in the Polar Ice.
Onboard the ms Prinsendam, Captain Christopher M. Turner and his crew carefully navigated our ship into this “chunky” water. We spent half of a day in the midst of the Polar Ice Cap. Hear the excitement in this brief video clip.
508.5 Nautical Miles from the North Pole
Since the melting occurs at different rates each year, the exact location changes every year. 2007 was a heavy melt year, and the Prinsendam sailed further north than in prior years — to the nautical position of 81°31, 5′ N, or 508.5 nautical miles from the geographical North Pole.
The 100th Voyage of the ms Prinsendam
If you’ve sailed on Holland American ships, you know that most of the crew is from Indonesia and the Philippines – the climatic opposite of the Polar Ice Cap. It was cold out on those decks in the middle of that giant sea-and-ice cocktail. Witnessing the officers’ and crew’s excitement and enthusiasm as they gathered on the ship’s bow for a staff photo celebrating the Prinsendam’s 100th voyage was another treat for the guests.
No Sunset
The temperature may be cool, but the sun never sets between late May and July this far north. Cruise programs usually list the times of sunrise and sunset. Here the program simply stated “No Sunset” on the days above the North Cape.
Getting to the Polar Ice Cap
We experienced the Polar Ice Cap on the 18-Day Top of the World cruise aboard the ms Prinsendam.
For 2011, Holland America Line has scheduled scenic cruising of the Polar Ice Cap on Saturday, August 6th aboard the ms Prinsendam. This scenic cruising is part of the 21-Day Arctic Explorer cruise, sailing from Tilbury, England (London) on July 25 and returning to Amsterdam on Monday August 15.
For another perspective on the Polar Ice Cap experience, check out this post from the Happy Alaskan blog.
We enjoy discovering new and unusual places. What about your travel passion? What’s your favorite destination discovery? Please share in comments. 
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A perfect day in Sonoma Wine Country starts with someone else driving. Here, Wine Country Limousine waits while we taste at Hanna.
We love San Francisco (where we lived for five years) and Sonoma Wine Country ( where we got married.) There’s never enough time to do both on our weekend visits to the Bay area.
Our solution: find a way to visit all of our favorite Sonoma County wineries in a day trip from San Francisco.
Here are 7 steps to our perfect day in Sonoma Wine Country in 10 hours or less:
1. Find someone else to drive. Carlos from Wine Country Limousines arrives at our San Francisco hotel at 8:45am, and our group is quickly on our way in an 8-passenger stretch limo, stocked with water, sodas, and champagne. Sipping our coffees, we sit back and enjoy the glorious view as we head north across the Golden Gate Bridge. Once we hit Santa Rosa, it’s time for a toast to a promising day.
2. Make the farthest winery your first stop. Since most tasting rooms don’t open until 10 or 11 am – we start with the longest drive. Our first stop is Hanna Winery in the Alexander Valley on Hwy 128 near Healdsburg. Hanna’s tasting room is open 10-4 daily. We love their Bismark Mountain Petite Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon wines, plus Vixon, a tasty red wine with a fun label, and the winery’s famous Sauvignon Blanc. The tasting room offers sweeping, gorgeous views of vines and the valley. If we sound enamored –we are– since every visit recalls fantastic memories of our wedding reception at this location.
3. Call ahead for lunch. Leaving Hanna, we call our lunch orders into the Oakville Grocery just off the town square in Healdsburg. You can download their menu here and call in your order at 707-433-3200. By the time we arrive in Healdsburg, our sandwiches are grilled and ready, and we pick up other essentials — pate, cheese and chocolate. All food goes into the trunk, and we are off to the Dry Creek Valley, home to some of our favorite Zinfandels.
6. Try a cult wine (if you have called ahead and secured an appointment.) America’s best Zinfandel (and our favorit)e is from A. Rafanelli Winery, a fourth generation family winery at 4685 West Dry Creek Road. You must make an appointment ahead to receive a specific time slot. It’s worth the trouble – you can’t purchase this wine outside of the winery except for the wine list of a few top restaurants. This tasting room is not a stuffy; the Rafanelli’s are extraordinary farmers, wine-makers and tasting room hosts.
7. Make a last stop at a unique tasting room. Besides great wines, Ridge Lytton Springs, 650 Lytton Springs Road has a classy tasting room that is surprising constructed from straw. Read about it while tasting Ridge wines.
There’s time for another stop, but we are tired. We arrange for our purchases to be direct shipped to our homes. Now, it’s time to sit back, watch a movie on the limo’s DVD player, and perhaps take a little nap. Carlos has us back in downtown San Francisco before 5:30pm.
This perfect day focused mainly on Sonoma County Red wines. If we were focusing on a mixture of whites and sparkling wines, we’d have a different mix of favorite wineries.
We enjoy wine and exploring the world’s wine-producing regions. What Sonoma County wineries would you visit on your “perfect” day? Please share in comments.
One of the winery dogs at Rafanelli Winery
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