Travel with a Cocktail

Did you know that Oakland International Airport is in CA (near San Francisco) and there is an Oakland County International Airport in MICHIGAN?!
We didn’t either – until we checked in to get our rental car and didn’t have a reservation for where we were and they were sold out of cars!
Don’t be like me – check the address when you’re confirming your reservations.

From the airport, we drove the 45ish minutes up to Napa and straight to Walmart pickup. Before our flight, I ordered drive up pick up of a case of water, car snacks like gluten free crackers for me and pretzels for him, and breakfast bars to keep in the room. This added maybe 10 extra minutes to our trip – including waiting for them to bring out the order – but added so much to our experience and probably saved us a bunch of money, too. We drank the entire case of water, plus the 2 waters our hotel gave us for reference.

I have such mixed feelings on our stay at the Archer Hotel in downtown Napa!
This was the most expensive hotel we’ve ever stayed at – almost $900 per night. And this trip was before I started the points game so we paid full price. *vomits*

That being said, the hotel was beautiful as was the room.
Service was impeccable – loved the happy hour wine served during check in.

We got a room with a balcony and it was so lovely to sit on but you’re overlooking a town road. What I didn’t read anywhere is that the street noise is SUPER loud – like we only slept because my husband travels with a fan and it was able to drown out the noise. On Saturday night, people were out “cruising the strip” and it was extremely loud.

Another reason I picked this hotel was because of the Charlie Palmer Steakhouse on site……. which we never ate at.
We did check in for our reservation at the rooftop whiskey bar – Sky & Vine – but after waiting 20 minutes and seeing how busy it was and experiencing the blaring music, we decided to bail and just head to dinner.

It was incredibly convenient on day 1 when we did tastings downtown, but we quickly realized we preferred the wineries up north, so we will stay in the St Helena area next time.

All in all, I didn’t think the Archer was a good fit and certainly not worth the money for our needs. Would recommend you pass on this one.

I would not do the tour and tasting again because the food served was far too sophisticated for my husband’s pallet and it was pricey. Still worth a stop if its nearby other destinations but I wouldn’t plan around this one. For us, we went way out of the way (up north) to go here. If I had known better, I would have cut this one and instead fit in a tasting at Brasswood Cellars.

Food wasn’t earth shattering but was ok. I loved that I could get a gluten free bun and we ordered from the winery so our food was ready when we got there! Every review and blog I read said if you’re in the Napa area, you gotta go here.

Charles Krug – we loved their $12 sauvignon blanc from Costco so we were pumped to try the entire range. This tasting room is BEAUTIFUL! Like if Restoration Hardware had a winery. We liked some of the wines but surprisingly not the newest vintage (aka year bottled) of sauvignon blanc. Only left with a bottle of Generations.

We LOVE this winemaker’s work – so much so that we are wine club members and have even hosted a virtual tasting for our friends at our house. The winemaker (Jason) makes Cabernets and Pinots that taste like nothing else we’ve ever had. He also makes one of my favorite Malbecs and he has a red blend called Shoulder of Giants that $45 and goes with every food and occasion.
Could not recommend adding this to your agenda enough!

My only regret on this one is that we didn’t have time to do a tasting or eat at Brasswood Cellars – both of which get great reviews. Next time I think we could make a day just of doing a Modus tasting, lunch at Brasswood’s on-site restaurant, and a tasting tour of Brasswood Cellars.

We actually bought several bottles of both red and white varietals from here. Most wineries will waive your tasting fee if you buy a certain amount of wine. If I remember correctly, we picked out several to cover the tasting fees and then as we went to pay, they said if we added 2 more we’d get free shipping. Of course at our 4th and last winery of the day we were like “sign us up!” and ended up shipping home way more wine than we intended.

We walked to this restaurant. The roasted chicken was not cooked well and very disappointing. The Penne Con Pollo pasta was excellent though and we really liked the wine we picked out. They corked it and gave us a nice to go bag with a handle to take the rest of the wine back to the room with us. Would recommend if you’re staying in downtown Napa.

Hall Winery has a reputation of making excellent Cabernets, which is our favorite grape. Also – I kept seeing the Rutherford location come up on lists for the most beautiful Napa experience because of their Chandelier Room.

This experience was VIP all the way!
It was just the 2 of us with our wine guide. We got a tour of operations and a private tasting in the Chandelier Room with cheese and nut pairings.

The wine was SO GOOD but waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy more than we’re comfortable spending. Of course, my favorite wine of the day was $400 per bottle so that will be a one-time taste for me.

Would recommend this experience to anyone who loves cabernet sauvignon if it fits in their budget.

I LOVED this tasting. Their rooftop, covered tasting patio overlooking the valley and surrounded by palm trees is the afternoon location of my dreams.
Their mid-range cabernets are pricey at about $110 per bottle with the wine club discount but they are SPECIAL. The label is beautiful. Their bottles make great special occasion wines and gifts.
Also – didn’t look like every wine guide did it but ours had little vials of ingredients and we would smell and compare to what we were tasting in the wine. Made it super unique.

Full transparency – we did cancel our wine club membership after a few shipments because its super pricey and we weren’t getting a significant discount. Also, we don’t drink wine at that price point often so we didn’t need to get several shipments a year.

This is a must stop in my opinion.