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One of the delights of my recent trip to southern Caifornis’a Temecula Valley was visiting its many small wineries – and sampling their wines.
I learned that there are over 30 wineries and 3,500 acres of producing vineyards, mostly family-owned, clustered in this rural area of rolling hills just a few miles east of Temecula, about an hour’s drive north of San Diego.
Oh, where to start?
Luckily, our good friends Ann and Gary, who live about an hour away, just happened to be in the area, conveniently camped next to us in the RV park. They know the area and they’re knowledgeable about the wines and wineries of the valley, so we volunteered them as guides.
I learned that trying to tour 30 wineries in one day is a little ambitious. For a number of reasons. You really need to take the time to savour the wines, And you need to keep a clear head if you want to appreciate their nuances. (Personally, I can’t bear to, umm… ‘discard’ the tastes.) We visited two that day – just about right.
This is Monte de Oro, one of the newest wineries in the valley.
Monte De Oro produces about 10,000 cases of wine a year from the 72 acres of grapes they have under cultivation. Their building and tasting rooms are gorgeous and the view – spectacular. And their wines are a delight.
What I like about tastings is that I get to discover new wines I like, and to enjoy and appreciate wines that are wonderful to sample - but that I wouldn’t necessarily want to drink in any greater amounts.
It can also get me out of the habit of always choosing the same kind of wine. I like full-bodied red wines and will usually come home with a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. (Heck, I’m just as likely to come with a box of Cabernet Sauvignon.) Good choice for me. I like them.
But this day I found I that preferred a Syrah, and surprisingly (to me at least), what has been called it’s cousin white, a Viognier.
The Viognier grape has been around since Roman times. It almost became extinct during the 1960′s (with fewer than 35 acres of vines – some say much less – remaining in France’s Rhône region). But that’s another story.
Fortunately for me, the grape has seen a resurgence and is now grown in many areas of the world, including BC. So now that I’m back, I can drink local.
It was a good day and, even though the Temecula Valley is a small, cozy region, there is still much for us to explore next time we’re there.
Time to get out of town and take our 23-foot motorhome on the road, find those picturesque 2-lane highways and scenic out-of-the-way campsites.
Not too rustic, though. As I like to say, roughing it is when you can’t use the air conditioner.
Follow our adventure at Wherever you go…
It all started with the ice cubes. I had limes, salt, and some tequila bottled in Hood River, Oregon. Now I needed ice cubes.
When we’re motorhoming, ice cubes are a feast or famine thing. Our more upscale fellow travellers have icemakers in their fridges, but we have to remember to put water in the ice cube trays (at a time we’re not planning to drive and slosh water all over the freezer) and then ration out the cubes one by one, or else buy a bag of ice cubes (which is too big to fit in the freezer) and use lots of ice cubes for everything before they all melt. (Is your vichyssoise cold enough, dear?)
So I started listing the must-have things our next motorhome would need: an ice maker, one of those sun-screens that goes on the awning so you don’t get too hot while sipping margaritas, an ice maker, a stereo with a remote control so you don’t spill your margarita when you get up to change stations, an ice maker….
Anyway, Margaret, being the more organized one, told me to settle down and pointed to the nice bag of ice cubes she had been making and storing in the freezer. Happy and cooler, I could now get down to what I really wanted to talk about – clams. And clam chowder.
We both were craving clam chowder yesterday. Margaret’s idea of making clam chowder is to start by taking the shovel, bucket, and rubber boots and heading down to the beach here at Birch Bay for fresh clams. Laudable but too much work, I said. Maybe if we were down at Kino Bay (on Mexico’s west coast) where we merely had to stand knee-deep in the surf and scoop up handfuls of baby clams by merely dipping our hands into the incoming waves. Besides, I added, the tide is probably in.
Canned clam chowder will do in a pinch — a nice on-the-road lunch paired up with some french bread. But this was going to be dinner.
We compromised. We’d make do with canned clams.
Margaret rummaged through the crisper. Sweet Walla-walla onions, celery, baby carrots, a cob of corn, Yukon Gold potatoes, a slice of lean bacon. She chopped and sautéed. I shucked and cooked the corn, and zipped off the kernels. She stirred and simmered. I stirred and simmered.
Not surprisingly, the fuss was worth it. Creamy clam chowder, home baked bread, a glass of wine, and a gorgeous sunset followed by a rising full moon. Can it get any better?
One of the things I like about RVing is that we have an opportunity to move around, to see new things, and, especially, to meet new people.
Back home in the suburbs, I hardly ever see my neighbors. Everyone is too busy rushing off to work, shopping, or appointments of some sort. Me too, when I’m there. If I’m lucky, I get a smile and wave from someone in a passing car. The cul-de-sac barbecues — the blocked off street, kids, old folks, people of all ages milling around, everyone cooking up a storm – well, they stopped happening years ago. Too bad. I miss them.
At the campground, most of time, people don’t have to go anywhere. Yes, there’s still shopping and touring and other distractions, but there’s also time to just hang around — to sit and watch other people walking by; to strike up conversations and meet the ‘neighbors’. Kind of like when people used to sit on their front porch after dinner in the summertime. (Do you remember front porches? Most people closed them up during the ’60′s to make the living room bigger so they could stay inside and watch TV. ) We’ve met some of our best friends just walking by.
Even if you don’t feel like talking, you can always just watch. It’s like the whole world
just wanders by. Eventually you’ll see just about everything and every kind of person. So much more interesting than being at home where everyone tries very hard to be same as everyone else.
So it was this year at one of our favorite campgrounds, Pio Pico (just outside of San Diego). I got up one morning, carried my mug of coffee outside to see what was new, and there, in among the staid line of RV’s, just like a fairy circle of mushrooms, a little tent city had sprung up overnight. As its inhabitants 
came and went, I saw that they all carried… things to juggle.
During the day, right next to the usual smattering of card players, line dancers, and jigsaw puzzle assemblers that gather in the lodge, was an energetic group of jugglers, clubs spinning in the air, flying back and forth, forward and back, over and under.
I had stumbled across San Diego’s first ever Pass-Out Jugglefest. Traditionally 
a European festival, this group of jugglers from several different states and countries assembled here to practice their passion: juggling – and in particular, to hone their skills in passing flying objects from one person to another. They were ready to share their tricks-of-the-trade and take part in an ongoing juggling jam session. The atmosphere was informal and fun. Skill levels went from novice to, well, amazing.
I was so inspired I headed back to the motor-home and dug out the juggling beanbags I bought several years ago. I’ll figure these babies out yet.
I wonder what I’ll get to see at the next place I visit?
* * *
Oh, and you should see how these folks have a pickup game of volleyball.
We’ve been members of Thousand Trails, a nation-wide membership campground system, for almost 20 years now. We’ve been to most of the campgrounds on the west coast, from Cultus Lake, an hour west of Vancouver, BC, to Pio Pico, less than 2 miles north of the Mexican border, close to San Diego.
It’s an interesting collection of properties. Each one has its own distictive character and feel. The staff are generally pretty nice and genuinely ready to help out. I mean, you can always run into a grouch or ne’er-do-well every now and then.
Our kids grew up in the system. Their camping has had them slip-and-sliding down the rolling hillside at Cultus Lake, climbing trees in Washington state forests, canoeing the river at Bend, Oregon, collecting seashells along the Oregon coast, climbing cliffs at Yosemite, and tracking families of raccoons at Rancho Oso, California (right next door to where Ranch Dressing was invented).
Unfortunately, the system is governed by an ever-changing barely-comprehensible corporate system that is so far removed from the camping experience that I doubt anyone at “corporate” can even comprehend what that means. Even worse, the corporate/member relations system is modelled on a bureaucratic structure that would make a top-heavy third-world government green with envy.
We found this out when Margaret decided to call them because our annual dues statement had not been sent to us this year and the friendly third-party financial-institutional web-based version was anything but.
While we were camped at Pio Pico at the time, the campground staff is not equipped to deal with membership issues or anything else even vaguely hinting of “corporate”.
First, she found that the member’s phone that has been in the lodge ever since we can remember was now gone. The 800 number for Member Services could not, she discovered, be called from a pay phone. Luckily, she found a sweet spot where her cell phone would work – displaying a couple of bars, anyway.
Ring-ring
“Thank you for calling… All busy… Your call is important… Please hold for the next….”
[Hold... Hold... Hold...]
[Hold]
“Hello, membership number please.”
She rattled it off.
“Please confirm your address and phone number.”
She did.
“How can I help you?”
“Well, we didn’t get our bill this year and….”
“We couldn’t send it out because we don’t have your address.”
Margaret looked puzzled. “Then why did you ask to confirm our address and phone number?”
“I didn’t ask you to confirm your address and phone number. Anyway, when we sent it out it was returned because you moved.”
“We haven’t moved for ten years.”
“Yes, but you haven’t phoned us since 2008.”
The conversation went downhill from there.
Our cell-phone sweet spot was on the road directly in front of our campsite. During the call, passers-by stopped, looked over, listened, cringed, chuckled, nodded their heads knowingly.
Margaret finally got a direct number for a supervisor.
Ring-ring
“Thank you for calling… Your call is important… Please leave a message….”
Blee-eep
Somewhere near Mojave, California
Well. We bolted.
Monday noon we were compaining about the miserable rainy Pacific Northwest weather. Late Wednesday afternoon we rolled our little motorhome into a small RV park near Mojave, California. When we got up this morning, it was to squint at the sun and admire the fluffy clouds in the blue sky. I’m sure I could hear and feel the dampness leaving my body. The carpets in the car were dry for the first time in months.
It’s mid November. It’s pleasantly cool this morning here in the high desert and warming up nicely. Even though the area has a reputation of always being windy (there are windmill power generators all over the hills around here) this morning there’s only an occasional light breeze.
My first ever visit to Mojave was in ’60 or ’61. I was on a California camping trip with my parents and we were heading into town, our canvas tent, Coleman cooler, and assorted camping gear packed inside and piled on the roof racks of a 1957 Pontiac Safari station wagon. As was the custom, we had a water-filled canvas bag hanging from our front bumper – just in case the radiator boiled over.
Hardly anyone had air conditioning then, especially if you were from “up north”. Even though it was insufferably hot, we had been driving across the desert with the car windows closed. It was far worse if we opened them. Then the hot air roared through the car like a blast furnace.
We rolled into the gas station at the crossroads. (Ding-ding.) The guy who pumped the gas (remember those guys?) was hosing down a big thermometer hanging on the front of the station.
My dad cranked down the driver’s window. “How hot is it?”
“Too hot,” came the answer. “But I’ve got it down to about 105 now.”
I don’t know what it is about the desert. I crave the desert. I feel like I belong here. I actually like tarantulas. (Cute fuzzy little guys.)
Where does that feeling come from? Is it genetic? Can’t be. I have no family history in desert country. All of my ancestors, as far back as I am aware, come from cold, wet, snowy climates. I was born, grew up, and spent most of my life in Vancouver, BC, (one of the nicest cities anywhere when the weather is nice) but never ever got used to that long, grey, cold, damp, drizzly stretch that runs each year from October to about March.
Sometimes I think it was all those TV westerns I grew up with as a kid. Bonanza. Gunsmoke. Have Gun Will Travel. Those guys were always riding their horses across the dry scrub and desert, worrying about how empty their canteens were and who was gunning for them or rustling their cattle. Sitting, watching, impressionable, in front our black-and-white RCA, I must have developed a sense that this kind of countryside was the right place to be.
Soon I’ll be back home, changing wiper blades and cursing the lousy defroster in my car. I think I have it all backwards. Instead of working all year in order to vacation for a few weeks in the sun, I should do it the other way around: fly up for a few weeks of lousy weather when I begin to miss it.
The air smelled of pine trees, campfires, and BBQs. It was a sunny afternoon and we were camped at Cultus Lake, relaxing in the shade of a big cedar tree. Our friend John (actually a relative, I’m told, but I can never get these things straight) stuck his head around the corner of the motorhome and said, “Hey! Have you got any chili sauce?” Margaret peered over her sunglasses at him. “Would you prefer Mexican, Thai, Cajun, or Chinese?”
Our motorhome has never been short of interesting spices and condiments. (Or books, but that’s another story.) Margaret can rustle around under the kitchen sink for a few moments and come up with the most amazing and obscure flavourings. When I’m cooking at home and don’t have the proper ingredients, I’ll head out to the driveway, where we park the motorhome, and yes, there I’ll find what I want.
Which is why I was surprised when, one Christmas at Palm Springs as we were getting ready to roast a turkey, Margaret couldn’t find any sage or poultry seasoning. “I’ll use something else,” she said.
Aargh-h-h! Non-traditional stuffing? I couldn’t stand it. (OK. I admit it. I’m not as gastronomically adventurous as she is. I’m not completely inflexible, but there is a proper way to season turkey stuffing.) “Just give me a few minutes,” I said, grabbed a measuring cup, and headed out the door.
I started at the campsite next door and knocked confidently on the trailer door. “Can I borrow a cup of sage?” I asked the Hawaiian-shirted man who opened the door. I explained my dilemma, easing the confused expression on his face a little. After consulting with someone inside, he shook his head and sadly told me they couldn’t help. Well, not everyone on the road cooks like we do. Can’t expect miracles.
On to the next site. The couple sitting under the awning looked curiously at my empty measuring cup. “Sage? Do you have any?” I told my sad tale of the stuffing about to go wrong, the sumptuous but somehow incomplete dinner being prepared as we spoke. No luck. Nice folks, but what? Do all these people eat their turkey dinners at the diner?
It took a little bit of searching and cajoling but finally one woman came out of her gleaming white fifth-wheel trailer, beaming and clutching a bottle of poultry seasoning. “This is mostly sage,” she said. “You can have it. I have two of them.”
I can truly say that the dinner was fabulous and the stuffing was, well, perfect. I also realized that my sage-hunting expedition, while it had something to do with spices and seasoning, had much more to do with meeting our neighbours.
Each inquiry I made with the empty cup in my hand turned into a conversation about us and them, where we had come from and why we loved travelling, introductions to pets, useful hints and suggestions about the area and on-the-road travel, and an invitation to come back and visit. And in the days that followed, during our walks around the park, we had lots of new friends who came up to ask how our dinner turned out and to chat about good times.
Which is why it’s a good idea not to have absolutely everything you need along on your trip.
My idea of a good time is sitting under the awning of my motorhome, checking out the view and tinkling the ice cubes in my glass.
In the suburbs, the idea of a good time is using up every spare minute of your weekend taking care of your lawn.
If you live in the suburbs you gotta have a good lawn. It’s expected. Unfortunately, even though I live in the suburb, I’m not a good lawn guy. Read the rest of this entry »
