Spent 3 days in Sonoma. Started with Domaine Carneros because that is our favorite place to sit outside and drink good sparkling. Le Reve 2005 was our tops there. They now make a number of Pinots. Not bad but not great for the price. Ravenswood. Meh, too much oak in everything. Robeldo, nice Pinots and a really good Tempranillo we bought two of. Matanzas Creek. Again, heavy hand with the oak. Arista, great tasting room guy. Jeff sat down and had cheese and salami with us and gave 4 of us free tasting. Wines were superb all through the list. Probably will bu a mixed case from them. Bacigalupi, was excellent. They are the vineyards that many other wineries buy from. Pinots were some of the best of the trip. Bought 3 bottles from them. VML on Westside road also finished our trip down that road. OK Pinots but heavy oak hand. Hawkes in city of Sonoma. So so wines. Again, too much oak. Wines way to extracted as well. Red Car, outstanding wines especially Pinots but some nice whites as well. Bough 1/2 case there. Dutton-Goldfield next door. Good Pinots but not as good as next door. Dutton, too much oak and way high alcohol levels for us. Very expensive as well. Kistler now has tasting room but you have to e-mail them first and wait for their answer. We never got an answer from them. Finished with Siduri. Huge number of wines source from everywhere including Oregon and Santa Barbara County. Good, not great. Did not get to Rochioli, Rafenelli, Martinelli, Merry Edwards on this trip. Palates were just tired out. Great overall trip to California.
Best finds were in Santa Ynez and Sonoma. Paso Robles just had too many high alcohol wines with little finesse.