This summer, we took the vacation we have dreamed about for years.
We dropped the kids off at Grandma and Grandpa’s house and headed to California wine country for a week. We managed to hit 15 wineries and three multiwinery tasting rooms in five days. That’s not necessarily a pace we would recommend to others, but for us, it was fantastic.
One of the highlights of the trip was visiting Lodi, about an hour and a half west of Napa. If you haven’t heard of Lodi, we’re pretty sure you will in the next few years as it is an up-and-coming destination spot.
And we have to say, even beyond the wineries – which were incredible – we fell in love with Lodi, and its true, laid-back, western farm-town feel. There are no pretensions here; just great wines and more than a century of grape-growing experience.
We decided to go to Lodi because Krista loves zinfandel, and her favorite zinfandel is made by Klinker Brick Winery there.
It is an area known for growing fabulous Old Vine zinfandel grapes, where the vines are generally 80 years old or older. And when they get to be that old, they tend to be these gnarly, bushy-looking grape vines instead of the thin well-groomed vines you typically see.
We started our day in Lodi at Klinker Brick (www.klinkerbrickwinery.com), which technically does not yet have a tasting room. But they will very soon, and they let us have a sneak peek of where it will be.
The tasting room was unlike the elegant spaces we saw in Napa and Sonoma. Klinker Brick’s tasting room is in a large garage and is filled with boxes and shipping supplies and a small tasting bar.
Of course, it doesn’t need to be large; the winery only makes three wines: Farrah syrah, zinfandel and Old Ghost (their premium zinfandel). But what they make, they make oh so well.
While we were in the tasting room, we had a visit from Fluffy the cat, who by all accounts loves visitors. The winery expects the tasting room will be open officially this year, and it’s definitely worth the stop after it’s ready.
After Klinker Brick, we headed to the Lodi Wine & Visitor Center (www.lodiwine.com/wine-visitor-center), where you can try wines from throughout Lodi, including the limited-edition wines made for Zinfest, the region’s zinfandel festival held each May. The attendants at the tasting room were extraordinarily friendly and happy to share the wines of their growing region.
From there, we headed to Woodbridge by Robert Mondavi, one of the largest wine producers in the country. The winery produces 5 million cases of wine a year and has its own wastewater treatment center. It’s big.
We don’t drink much, if any, Woodbridge wines, but a lot of people do, and it was amazing to see a wine “factory” that turns out millions of bottles of wine a year. It was a fascinating experience for us, and we would recommend the tour if this is the kind of thing that interests you.
It also gives a peek into Lodi’s history – the Mondavis moved there during Prohibition to get into the business of shipping grapes to the East Coast for home winemaking, which was still legal. Even then, Lodi’s Central Valley soils were major grape producers.
We stopped at another multiwinery tasting room in the tiny town of Woodbridge – we had to, it was called Uncorked – and tasted a few more wines from the Lodi area. Many of them weren’t quite as sophisticated as the larger wineries, but they are pretty good, and with a few more years under their belts, they’ll get even better.
After having some amazing Michael David wines (www.lodivineyards.com) at the visitor center, we decided it was worth a stop at the winery. You may be familiar with some of their wines: 7 Deadly Zins, 6th Sense Syrah and Incognito. But they make a lot more than that.
We fell in love with the Earthquake series of wines: cabernet sauvignon, Syrah and Zinfandel, as well as a wine called Chicken Duck (really, who could resist a wine named Chicken Duck?).
We ended the day having dinner in downtown Lodi, which is a great area, and visiting the weekly farmers market. This market puts others to shame. Each Thursday in the summer and early fall, one of the main downtown streets is shut down from 4 p.m. until after dark for a multiblock farmers market. The stores and restaurants offer specials during farmers market season, and the streets are packed.
Our trip had so many highlights, but we have no doubt we will take a return trip to Lodi. So as you plan your wine trip, make sure you schedule time to head over there. It’s a little out of the way but worth every minute of the trip.
Cheers!
