A few weeks back, I was treated to an enlightening appellation-specific tasting of Santa Lucia Highlands wines courtesy of the host, Hahn Family Wines. Santa Lucia Highlands sit on the southeast facing slopes of the Santa Lucia mountain range, on one side of the plentiful Salinas Valley. I made the somewhat significant trek down there with my trusty vinopanions, the Brix Chicks‘ Liza (Twitter) and Xandria (Twitter). I hadn’t been down in the area since I was but a wee lad, noshing with me folks, so it was a treat to see the Valley again. It was in all of its late Spring splendor and we enjoyed taking in the bountiful scents of the fruits and vegetables growing near the highway.

A little while back I was given the chance to attend a very special gathering of established winemaker luminaries and taste a whole slew of outstanding wines, courtesy of a very gracious invite by Monica Collins of All Access Napa Valley. I’ve never seen such a lineup of All-Star winemakers, nor the chance to have such access to speak with those that make or have made famous wines such as Kamen, Screaming Eagle, Scarecrow, The Prisoner, Rocca Family and L’Angevin. The event was held at the innovative ACME Fine Wines in St. Helena. Ever since opening their doors in April of ‘03, co-owners and organizers of this event Karen Williams and David Stevens have consistently reinvented the wine retail, storage and event industries. Their efforts have been noticed by numerous newspapers and wine writers.

I think at this point, it comes as no surprise that I like the wines from Carmel Valley and Georis Winery, in particular. They’re my favorite winery, in fact, from my favorite appellation. So, what could be just as awesome as my favorite winery’s, appellation-specific wine? A new wine from the winemaker from my favorite winery in my favorite appellation, of course! Damien Georis, winemaker for Georis Winery (no relation…maybe) has released the second chapter of his personal label, Madeleine.

Last April Fool’s day, I received what seemed to be a nicely written, yet rather surprisingly nifty wine event invite in my inbox asking if I’d like to meet with Laurent Sauvage, winemaker for the leading family of wines from the Languedoc in the South of France, Robert Skalli Wines. We were to meet with Laurent at CAV, the outstanding wine bar and restaurant along Market in the Opera District of San Francisco (and part-owned by none other than Doug Cook (Twitter), founder of Able Grape).

In the year of their 20th anniversary, St. Supéry Vineyards & Winery (Twitter) hosted the 2nd Wine Bloggers Forum (WBF) at their beautiful Estate in Rutherford, Napa Valley, California on Saturday, 04/04/09. The event continued the spirit of intimate and collaborative blogger and industry interaction that was first started as an offshoot of the WBC that debuted last year. The first WBF was at Hahn Family Estates in their Napa business offices and perfectly organized by the incomparable Lisa de Bruin (Twitter). This latest edition was organized by Lesley Keffer Russell (Twitter), VP of Marketing and Sales at St. Supéry.

The kind folks at Icon Estates have been worried about all of us out here in US wine-drinker land. They realized back in March that tax time is hard on all of us wine grunts, particularly this year when everyone is still reeling from watching their life savings (and future wine purchasing potential) shrivel by -40% and see a world filled with recession and job loss. They realized that everyone’s day or night (or both!) can be brightened by wine, however and put together a great list of wines to have while stumbling through filling out your requisite tax forms: Tax Time Wines! Susan and co. at Icon kindly shot out some wine samples for various bloggers to try including the prolific 1WineDude (Twitter, Twitter2), Luscious Lush Thea (Twitter, Twitter2) and yours truly (Twitter), among others.

I’m very excited to be attending the Wine 2.0 San Francisco Expo tonight at Crushpad! I first mentioned the event in my precap a week ago and since then, many more details have been added. I’ll be blogging throughout the event in the WineLog.net sponsered Bloggers’ Lounge, that the WineTwo folks have again provided for this event (thanks Cornelius, Smoke & Co!). Watch this space for further details and updates through to 10pm tonight!

Continuing where the 1976 Paris tasting left off after the success of the fictionalized account Bottle Shock, this past summer, that growing hotbed of boutique winemaking, Bakersfield, CA is planning their own global wine showdown next month. First broken by the Dregs Report, this promises to be the biggest tasting since the last time Europe and America clashed in the wine business.

ZAP Zinfandel Festival 2009This year’s ZAP Zinfandel Festival I ran into a number of good wines. One of the interesting ones that I got to try (again actually) and get some back story is the Paso Creek Paso Robles Zinfandel 2006. While having a taste, I chatted with Susan Bergland, Public Relations Manager at Icon Estates a bit about their newer estate vineyard and winery.

The second and last day of our latest Pops & Son Wine Trip series took a dramatic turn, ie, Pops was no longer involved, unfortunately! That cold that was was starting to come over him in the morning of the first day and then really kicked in during the afternoon? Well, it hit big time and he woke up this day feeling terrible…no wine for Pops! Poor guy ended up in bed all day…so our plans changed!