Temecula with Friends

We had a marvelous day with our friends Tom and Deb yesterday. You might recall that we spent a week in Whistler, B.C., with them a few summers ago. All four of us went to the same high school, although we graduated different years. (Deb and I were in the same class.) As Deb puts it, we didn't realize how much we missed one another until we reunited on Facebook a few years back.

I'll tell you that I have mixed feelings about Facebook, but the one thing I love about it is reconnecting with good friends lost to time and distance.

We started out at the Chapin Family Vineyards in Temecula, California.  And whoa! Look at that! Blooming things!

It was a pretty setting. Down these stairs...

to their nice tasting room. They had tasting both inside, standing at their bar, or there was also seating outside. We tried three different places for outside seating. At each place, we were just a little too chilly with the breeze, and so we ended up inside before finishing up there.

Take a look at those geraniums. Spring is coming, my friends. Get ready!

We've done a lot of wine tasting in Oregon, and we generally stick with wineries where we are members. Back home, we waltz in and taste any and all the wines we want to free of charge. Here, we kind of had to get the lay of the land. It's improved from our experience in Northern California wine country some years ago. Back then, it was a flat $20 to taste. It was rather appalling to us since we were used to tasting for free back home, membership or no. (Free tasting is a thing of the past in Oregon now too, and you can hardly blame them.) In any case, now it seems one lays out a flat fee for a designated number of tastings. Here, at Chapin Family Winery, we were given some chips to trade in for the wines we wanted to taste. The service there was excellent, and we enjoyed the wines.

Also, we had some cheese and crackers, which was nice. I don't know about you, but I can't drink much wine on an empty stomach. The cheese and crackers were a nice addition.

From there, we decided to head into "old town" Temecula.

Now, you must first understand that Mike and I have not seen Temecula since high school, and the place has grown into quite a thriving tourist destination now. Back then, the population was barely over 100 people. It was something of a joke, even though our town of Vista wasn't exactly overcrowded back then. Here's an image from 1909:

The thing I remember most is that Clorox had a television commercial about knocking on the doors of all the residents of Temecula and trading them a bottle of Clorox for their old brand. A month later, they went back and surveyed the residents about how much they liked their Clorox. Of course, they were all astounded at how much cleaner their laundry was.

Fast forward to yesterday, and the city looks like this. We were in the "old town" area, but it's expanded to include much more of the countryside. It was clogged with traffic and lots of folks walking on the boardwalk sidewalks. It was hard to find a place to park, but Tom was able to expertly fit us into a parallel space in the middle of town.

Old town is located along "Historic US 395," which is the route we'll take when we head for home.

Across the street was this structure.

We ducked off on a side street and found this nice place to sit and taste more wine while listening to some good music.

This was the floor of their entryway.

The tasting room for Lorimar Vineyards & Winery is also an art gallery. We sat toward the back of the room. Looking toward the front door it looked like this:

From where we sat, it looked like this:

Who sees a quilt design here?

Look how pretty the label is for their wine.

We tasted some really great wines here, and just enjoyed visiting with one another and catching up.

After drinking so much wine, we really needed some food, and so we headed off for a bite to eat before saying good-bye to one another for the evening.

The sun was setting as we headed back to the RV, and so you might say we put the day in the rear view mirror.

What a fun way to spend a beautiful Sunday.

We're off to a slow start this morning. It's really the first day we've had nothing planned...and I mean nothing. We'll probably get out for a walk, and I need to make a trip to the post office, but there's no rush on either. Before I go, I wanted to tell you about a Google Alert I received today for a good cause.

From the accompanying article:

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper is planning an on-line quilt auction for the Fall of 2018. We are asking you to donate a beautiful quilt for the auction that conveys the theme of “Artful Healing.” All proceeds from our on-line auction will benefit the Pink Roses Teal Magnolias Fund, which raises funds for breast and gynecological cancer clinical and research programs at MD Anderson Cooper.

If you're like me, you have lots of quilts made up that could really use a home. Here's an idea for you. I'm thinking of donating my quilt, A Day in the Life of Mr. Bear.

It might be hard to let it go, but I'm thinking about it. Anyway...here's the information if you're interested. Just click on that link for all the details.