Storming the Castello

Napa -- Day 2

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

The Best Western Inn at the Vines is adjacent to a Denny’s restaurant, where they offer hotel guests breakfast at a discount, or a free slam-type breakfast as part of the hotel room package.  So we had breakfast there before heading back out to St. Helena.  It was still drizzling until we arrived at Castello di Amarosa.

Where's Bro?

I had never been on the castle tour before, and Bro was interested, so we decided to take the tour, which includes admission and wine tasting.  The gal who sold us the tickets thought my shirt was funny (I was wearing the shirt that I bought while wine tasting at Wilson Creek, which says “Drink til he’s cute”).  We discussed the yumminess that is Almond Champagne and the fact that she’s never been wine tasting in Napa even though she lives there.   Bro’s aim was to learn to build his own castle.  My aim was just to see everything that you don’t usually get to see with the General Admssion ticket.   The first room  was a chapel, and our tour guide, Jefferson, told us that the owner Dario Sattui bought the land with the thought of building a villa on the 8500 square foot property.  That vision grew, and over the course of 14 years, we have the castle as it is today, mostly built of hand-made materials.  The stones were brought over from Europe in 170 containers. Jefferson told us that Jon Bon Jovi had a concert in their courtyard.  Ooh, what a cool venue!  

Jon Bon Jovi was Here

 The murals in the Great Dining Hall were hand-painted by 2 gentlemen from Italy.  The chairs were handmade.  

Great Dining Hall

The torture chamber was filled with replicas of torture devices such as the rack and “the hot seat”.  I thought that the spiked case was interesting because he said that they would place someone in there, and the spikes are strategically placed so that they don’t actually kill you.  Instead, they open up the top, and place an animal inside, like a rat or whatever, so that you’re alive when it’s doing whatever it wants to you.  Eeeewww.  

Torture Device

 The tour also included an explanation of the different methods of their winemaking.  The castle is an actual working winery, and there are pipes throughout the castle walls, which lead to the caves underneath, where all of the barrels are stored.

Pipe from Castle Wall to Barrel

 The barrels can be bought as futures, and they store the barrel there.  When you want to take some of your wine out, they will bottle it for you.  It’s pretty cool because you can get a LOT of wine (300 bottles) per barrel, and because it’s wine, the longer you keep it there, the better it becomes and the more expensive it becomes.  So you’re essentially investing in your wine.  We even got to drink some 2012 Cabernet Sauvingnon that came directly from the barrel, to have the same experience as the winemaker when they open a barrel.  

Jefferson Pouring Wine from Barrel

We did get to go into the caves and walk among the barrels.  They even had a little armory filled with suits of armor.  People were taking pictures, and Jefferson offered to take a picture of me with “my son”.  

With Suit of Armor and My "Son" Bro

I didn’t have the heart to correct him because he had been such a wonderful guide.  He had asked me what kind of wine I like to drink, and I told him that my favorite one from Castello is the Il Passito.  He couldn’t blame me at all for that.  :)  When we got to the end of the tour, we were led to a private tasting room and were allowed to try 5 wines each, so Bro and I decided to try 10 wines and share each taste.  We ended up getting the 2009 Napa Valley Sangiovese, which is very smooth.  At the end of the 10, Jefferson offered to give us a splash of the Il Passito as well, and you know I’m not going to say no to that!  I let Bro taste first so that he could understand my love for this wine, and he did.  That just totally made my day to have a taste of my favorite wine without having to open my own bottle at home.  I did drink one this year, so the next one can wait.  Before leaving, we looked at the animals, which included emu, some ducks that were bathing in what looked like feed bins, and a couple of beautiful albino peacocks.

Albino Peacock Strutting His Stuff

We were hungry, so we decided to look for a place to eat in St. Helena.  We parked in a lot that was made of rocks and painted lines on the rocks.  I don’t know how often they hae to paint that lot, but it seems like a lot of work.  

On Asphalt from Parking Lot

While we were perusing restaurant menus, a couple of women sitting outside at one of the restaurants asked if they could take a picture of my shirt because they thought it was cute.  I obliged and wondered if my face was in the picture.  I smiled just in case.  We decided to eat at HImalayan Sherpa Kitchen, which served Indian and Nepalese cuisine. Bro ordered chicken tikka masala, and I ordeed the lunch special of samosas and paroukash with mixed greens and cucumber mint sauce.  The food was very good, athough they didn’t have any yak’s milk with which to wash it down.  They did have a yak on a shelf!

Black Yak

The St. Helena Bath Oil Company was closed for a few minutes, so we went into The St. Helena Olive Oil company.  I asked the store guy to tell Bro about the place because I wouldn’t do it justice.  Bro and I tried some Himalayan Pink salt in order to keep the theme of the day.  I bought 2 bottles of white truffle oil because Linda wanted one, too.  Then we went back to the Bath Oil place so that I could buy my lovely Lavender Sugar Scrub.  I would have tried out the Salt Scrub this time, but they only had the large jars on the table.  

I wanted to continue wine tasting, and we had coupons to use, so we went to Provenance and used our 2 tastings for 1 coupon.  Bro and I agreed that the 2009 Rutherford Cabernet Sauvignon that we tried was the best, but I didn't buy any because it is available in stores.  (Castello’s wines are only available for purchase through them directly).

We then went to Yountville so that I could go to Bouchon Bakery.

A Pastry Case at Bouchon

 I had heard many good things about their pastires, especially their macarons.  Macarons are currently my favorite sweet thing to eat, so I NEEDED to try it out.  They also had almond croissants, so I couldn’t say no to that either.  I got 3 flavors of macarons:  pistaschio, salted caramel and hazelnut, so that I could share with V when we saw her.  Their macarons are much bigger than the ones I usually get a ‘lette.  Their almond croissant was VERY almond-y.  I was happy.

Mmmmm....Macarons!

We returned to our hotel and I rested for a bit while Bro took a dip in the pool.  We eventually went to dinner at Black Bear Diner.  I thought that the lady serving us there was competing with the people at China Village Inn because she was getting things done so quickly.  I ordered chicken fried steak from the A Little Less menu.  Well, there was a lot on my plate already and I looked over to see a regular-sized meal.  Wow.  It was twice as much main meal as mine.  Mine even came with sauteed vegetables, mashed potatoes, soup (or salad) and a cornbread muffin.  Bro also had an item from the Little Less menu: meatloaf.  He was able to finish his, but I couldn’t finish my plate due to the fact that I ate an almond croissant earlier when we were hanging out at the hotel.

The Black Bear Diner Pose

We turned in for the night after Bro showed me the location of the fitness room so that I could work out in the morning.

The next morning, I did get up and walk on the treadmill.  The gal that joined me there later was doing some kind of circuit-type workout, which made the guy on the cycle next to me look at her every time she did a leapfrog-type move along the mats.  I was just glad to get my workout in.  I was also glad that I wasn’t the one that dropped one of the weights loudly.  Bro and I had our breakfast at Denny’s (I made a Egg McMuffin out of my build-your-own slam), and we checked out of the hotel.   We said goodbye to Napa and headed for San Francisco to pick up V from the airport.  She had been having a difficult time getting there from Seattle, so she had much venting to share with us.  At least we were all together again, giggling as usual.

I love my family.