Friday was the sandwiched day of our trip, a continuation of the 4th wine trip that I've taken with Pops.
I wrote about the first day when we visited
Flora Springs via
GiftyBox and
Pope Valley Winery. It was the beef in our burger, cold cuts in the sammy, ice cream in the
It's-It, or...ok, enough! Anyhow, Friday was our transition day to from
Napa to
Sonoma. It was also the only day on the trip where Pops and I had no set plans.
We started the day as usual, having coffee at
Brown's Valley Yogurt & Espresso Bar, with Pops' buddies. Following that, we headed out, alllll the wayyyy to
Sonoma (it's about 20 minutes max, from my Parents' home in Brown's Valley,
Napa). Our first stop was actually a couple miles South of Sonoma at one of our favorite diners, the
Schellville Grill. It's been serving great down-home food for decades and almost just as consistently, flooding every Winter. The all-important big wine-tasting breakfast accomplished, we headed further South to the Sonoma portion of
Carneros after some thoughtful planning over our country potatoes.
Day 3 of our wine trilogy was my last day with Pops on this, our 4th Wine Trip together. I wrote about the first day in Napa, here and the second, more freestyle day in Sonoma, over here.
Today we were focused on the whole reason we included Sonoma on this particular trip and a reason for which I had quite a bit of excitement...a semi-trade, private reserve tasting at longtime Sonoma Valley stalwart, Chateau St. Jean.
My family from my grandparents down to my sister and I have been making our way over to our neighboring Valley for decades to picnic and tool around the beautiful grounds. I have to admit however, that despite having many of their more mass-produced wines, I couldn't remember ever tasting any of their Reserves or winery-only limited run wines. I was about to cross those off my list! 
OK, so I wasn't off gift shopping for some flowers to take to the Pope, I admit it. His continent was involved, however. A few weeks back, my sister and my mom headed off into the skies towards a three week trip in London and Paris. Freed from familial ties, my Dad and I decided that it was time for another Pops & Son Wine Trip, this time in the Summer. Previous wine trips taken during my week off from the