12 of 12 a week late with video

We had a great time in California but it was a tough journey home. Our first leg was delayed so we missed the last flight to Montreal out of Chicago. They booked us on the morning flight instead and gave us a meal and hotel voucher. That was great and all, but there were only 3 1/2 hours of sleeping time available to us. So now there's all sorts of things that need doing and, here let me go check, 986 items in my blogfeed. Oy. Plus it's back to work Monday morning for a full week. Oh goody gumdrops.

So. I thought I'd do this in 2 or 3 parts so that I can milk more blog posts portray the trip more accurately. We flew to Sacramento, rented a car and then stayed in Petaluma for two nights. On Sunday the 12th, we toured the Sonoma and Napa valleys. Although it was Easter, many wineries were open and traffic was lighter than I would have expected on such a delicious spring day in wine country. We visited 3 wineries (including Sterling, a very commercial operation but which offers a view to die for) and had a picnic with deliciousness procured from Dean and Deluca. Here goes the 12 of 12 from that day. All pics will fill the screen upon clicking.

After 7 months of winter, we were both filled with glee over the 70 degree temps and sunny skies. It was just perfect and the scenery was stunning. Here look:

See?

Serge calls this the pignose photo. Those are cows on my Ben & Jerry's shirt.

I love this shot. The camera made the first noise but not the second indicating a picture had been taken. It's a candid shot even though we were posing.

At ten am, we stopped into Alpha Omega and we should have known it was going to be pricy due to the lovely pond and fountain deal they had out front. I had never heard of this wine and as I suspected had only been in production for a few years.

At the Sterling winery, it's kinda gimmicky as they take you up on a sky gondola and then you tour the hilltop operation with wine tastes along the way.

I know the sun is bad for you. But I couldn't help it, it just feels so nourishing sometimes.

This scene could have been in Italy, Spain, Chile or France. Pastoral kept coming to mind.

The souvenir photo spot. I got a great laugh here because Serge didn't have the setting right on the camera and started taking a movie. I knew it, but it took him a bit longer to realize. Here watch:



(I keep playing it set on loop and it cracks me up each time.)

At our hotel in Petaluma, I noticed an error with prepositions on the comment card. I use these things in my class for a "find the mistake" activity. Who proofed that? That's a pretty lame error.

The old town Petaluma at sundown.

On Tuesday or Wednesday I'll put some more pics up. After our sejour in wine country, we went to the Mendocino Coast for fun family frolics for five days. More on that later.