We went wine tasting today for my sweetie's birthday. Admittedly, I wasn't keen about driving over hill and dale just to taste some wine. The weather was bleh and I wanted to lie under the covers all day and watch DVDs. But it wasn't my birthday, and although I could say no, I would lose many valuable girlfriend points. Here's the recap (and unless specified, all references to Pinots are for Pinot Noir):

Rex Hill – The two Pinots they offered didn't knock our socks off, but they were decent. Each vintage was $45 a bottle, which I consider steep even for wine I love. We didn't end up purchasing, but I would keep them in mind when trying wines again, plus our hostess was really nice.

Rex Hill was also where we first ran into the "OC b*tches" (my pseudo-affectionate name for spoiled, self-centered, Abercrombie and Fitch-clad sorority girls and frat boys), who pulled up in their white stretch Hummer (and accompanying white stretch limo) on their quest to see how many wineries it would take for them to become obnoxiously drunk (just one, as it turns out).

Erath – We tried their complimentary flight of wines, starting with a '03 Pinot Blanc and a '04 Pinot Gris (although we aren't really into white wines), then the '04 Pinot and the '01 Cabernet. We finished with a flight of their '02 Pinots (Estate, Prince Hill and Leland).

After tasting our first flight, the OC b*tches showed up, noisily entering the tasting room and complaining about the small pours (um, this isn't a kegger, dude). The staff was unfazed, one of the hosts instantly had 4 stems in each hand, set them on the bar and poured the first wine from the list for any one who wanted one.

We ended up purchasing the '01 Cabernet (it's their final vintage) and the '02 Prince Hill Pinot and two bars of fancy chocolate (yum!), then fled from the crowd with our treasures.

(Side note: the Erath site helpfully diagrams how to open their screw caps and why they – gasp! – don't use cork. This diagram is useful for the one of us (the "not me" one) who has attempted – while sober – to "uncork" the screw cap.

Stone Wolf – We stopped here because we inadvertently passed a couple wineries on our route. After talking with the host, we realized we were hopelessly past Duck Pond and that we'd just passed Chateau Benoit, which had been bought out and renamed Anne Amie (which is why we passed it).

Anyway, Stone Wolf had mostly whites available for tasting, which aren't my personal preference. But they did have, if not spectacular, at least a very solid '01 Pinot. Their host recommended we go to a nearby winery, Walnut City WineWorks, and proceeded to write down directions. In the moment, we didn't give it serious consideration, wanting to get back on track with the wineries we wanted to visit.

We became instantly lost after going in what we thought was the direction of 99W, when lo and behold what should appear before us but Walnut City WineWorks! We figured if divine providence guided us here, we should probably go. Don't want to be pissing off the wine gods.

Walnut City WineWorks – The small bar seemed like an afterthought added to the production area. We walked in to find two guys at the end of the bar closest to us, one of them studiously bent over a piece of paper, so we sat down on the other side of the bar. Come to find later that they were both winemakers and the one was sampling his wine in order to write up a pithy description. Our hostess, in all her glorious coolness, poured us a variety of reds and chatted with us, although the winemakers chatted with us a bit as well.

A bit of conversation with the (non-writing) winemaker went like this:

Winemaker: Taste this and tell me what you get.
My fiancée: (taking glass) um, well…ok. (takes a sip)
Winemaker: Aren't you getting a hint of winter spice?
My fiancée: um…I don't think so.
Winemaker: Taste it again. (he takes another sip) You sure you're not getting winter spice?
My fiancée: I'm pretty sure I'm not.
Winemaker: (looks at me) Try it and tell me what you get.
Me: (having pretty good buzz going now) I'm getting black cherry.
Winemaker: (blatantly dismayed that I'm an idiot) Black cherry?!? How are you getting black cherry??? (takes back wine and goes back to other end of the bar)
Us: (in unison – after getting back in the car) What in the HELL is winter spice?!?

After drinking Pinots all day, the Merlot she poured tasted divine. We ended up getting a bottle of that and one of their Pinots, and we were off to the final winery on our list.

Anne Amie – This is a beautiful winery that I would love to spend more time at when it's not so crowded. Most of the floor space near the bar was sectioned off for a wedding or wedding-related function. On top of everything, the OC b*tches showed up, one of the girls sporting a plastic tiara (of course) and got us to wondering if they had anything to do with the wedding thing (the thought of them mating and spawning makes me throw up in my mouth a little), so we sneaked out, hopped into the car and headed straight for Pelican Brew Pub for beer and burgers (mmm. cow.)

My sweetie drove us home (I slept, as usual) in the torrential downpour, then we drug our puny tired bodies to bed.

Happy birthday to the bestest man in the whole wide world. LYBB.