After a few morning chores around the motorhome, we headed out to Cambria Winery in Santa Maria hills. Cambria was started by the same family as Kendall Jackson. The wife and daughters are still an important part of the business. It is pretty far out there through curvy mountains roads. It's usually our first or last stop along Foxen Canyon when we go tasting. We joined Cambria's wine club several years ago but there is a catch. Ohio does not allow shipping of wines. So we have it shipped to the office and collect when we can. Last winter, someone at the office was being nice and shipped us a box to Canton before we gave the go ahead. Well it was the middle of one of those negative wind chill days in January...the box sat over night on a FedEx truck and you can guess what happened next. Our $100 worth of wine exploded:( So We have left our wine sit at the office a little this year and when I arrived last week there were 4 beautiful filled boxes of yummy waiting for us.
As wine club members, we get free tastings. The kids packed up some Legos to play and we took a little picnic lunch. When we arrived we were excited to find out they are now making grape juice sodas. The kids were able to try Chardonnay and Pinot Noir grape soda! and loved it of course.
Cambria's regular winery tours were canceled that day due to live music and more people being around. The tasting room manager, Brian, was kind enough to show us around since we came from so far. Lily was especially interested in the two science labs they have. Testing the grapes from one year to another in the same vineyard...Mother Nature controls it all from year to year. Harvest is actually starting about 2 weeks early this year and will begin next week.
New oak barrels stacked in the front awaiting new juice and aged oak barrels in the back stacked up by six.
Outside is where all the Chardonnay grapes are processed! And yes we walked that high on the catwalk.
Very neat how it all is processed and made.
Brian so kindly offered to take our picture with Kaherine's Vineyard in the background. I didn't have he heart to tell him that we would be all covered in shadows because it was 2 pm high sun in Cali.
Katherine's Vineyard waiting to become he Benchbreak Chardonnay, my favorite.
After Cambria we tried a Riverbench down the street. In all the years we have never been there. Adorable old craftsman style house with a nice outdoor area. We shared a tasting for $15. It was good but a bit pricey for us.
And look at these good kids!
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