Monterey Road Trip
Tues. 9-16 to Sat. 9-20-2008
Mike Rome, who was an undergrad and then tech in my lab, and Jordan Mendler, a friend of ours, who I met through Rome since they grew up together in Tarzana, left on a road trip Tuesday. Each year, they go up to the Monterey Jazz Fest. This time I came along. We left Tuesday morning and headed up to San Luis Obispo. First stop was at Firestone Grill, where we had amazing tri-tip BBQ beef sandwiches. They cost like $8.50, but had a ton of beef. And the BBQ sauce was kinda sweet, very tasty. We shared a basket of fries, but couldn't finish them. Guess you need 4 guys to share.
We then headed up the 101 to Paso Robles and the Firestone Brewery (I think unrelated to the Grill, but this is the one that supplies the Firestone Pale Ale and Double Barrel Ale that is sold throughout CA). They only have factory tours at 3pm on Saturdays, so we missed out, but got to drink mugs of beer for $6, along with free pretzels and mustard. I had some Little Opal, this light beer that was only 3.5% alcohol. Good, as I was driving. But we all had trouble finishing after our lunch. We then headed back to SLO for the night, to check out the bars. This was Tuesday night, so probably not the biggest bar night. But there were still quite a few people at this place called the Frog and Peach. $2 pints, although the first was $5. This band, Sad Lisa, started playing, although only after they got their pitcher of beer. By then we were slightly hungry again (this was hours later), so we went to Woodstock's Pizza, which our friend who went to SLO raves about. It was decent. Happy hour, so the beer was actually cheaper than at the bar. I got a pint of Amber Bock for $2. Good St. Louis beer, I think made by Budweiser. We walked around more and found a more chill bar down at the end of the crowded part of Higuera Street. Rome couldn't finish his beer. Party foul.
The next morning, we stopped at the Firestone brewery again. It was really more like noon by that time. And then drove up the 101 to Rohnert Park, where we were staying. We didn’t get there until 5:30. Once we got there we learned that all the wineries close by 6. Mendler looked up breweries and found this place, Dempsey’s, in Petaluma, back down the 101 a bit. We drove down there, and the GPS told us to turn into this strip mall, which we didn’t believe. But it turned out to be correct. We had some beer there-Rome and Mendler this stout, I had a red. Not bad. We then went to a Chinese place called Chopsticks. Not bad. The most interesting thing was a painting in the bathroom of a Chinese lady in a one-piece bathing suit with huge hands and tiny feet. There were these guys in the background leering at her.
Thursday was wine day. We left Rohnert Park and drive down the 101 to the 12 to go to some wineries. The first one we stopped at was this mansion called Ledson. Apparently this guy had begun building a mansion to live in, and then decided to turn it into a winery. It was kinda expensive. Mendler asked if there was any free tasting, so the guy gave us a sample of their Chardonnay, but said that was all he could give for free. Mendler suggested we were kinda cheap, and asked if there were any free wine tasting places around. The guy suggested a few. He also recommended going to check out Ferrari-Carano Winery in Dry Creek Valley, as they apparently put 400 hours of labor a week into the upkeep of their grounds. We then asked about breweries, and the guy and another got into a heated argument over which was better-Russian River Brewing Co. or the Third Street Aleworks, in nearby Santa Rosa. They agree that Third had better food, but were split on which had better beer. So we headed back north to the Dry Creek area. Somehow we input W. Dry Creek Road instead of Dry Creek Road, and couldn’t find the place. But that was good, because we found some other places. First we stopped at Zichichi. It looked kinda ghetto from the road, but was relatively nice and modern. Zichichi charged $5 for tasting 4 wines, so we tried it. Some guy was talking to him about awards, and Zichichi suggested that some awards aren’t really worth much. Some guy in Italy had faked a whole winery entry in some competition, and won a few awards. Without ever sending any wine. Apparently almost all of Zichichi’s stuff was sold out already, but he took us into the pressing room to sample some not-quite-finished reds. Rome thought his petite syrah was great. I couldn’t really tell. However, the grapes they had in crates outside were very good. We went on to the Raymond Burr Winery. It was free. And we could tell not as good. We asked the guy there about other free or cheap places, and he suggested Bella and Preston down the road. We headed over, passing by Preston, and stopped at Bella. They had a building that was just bathrooms. The tasting room was in a cave. Mendler again took the lead and asked about free wine, as we’re poor college kids. The woman said it was $5, but quickly decided to let us have at it for free. An older couple that had already paid was not terribly pleased. We had about 6 reds there, including a dessert wine that was really sweet, but I still liked. The woman kept explaining the wines to us, and then at one point suggested she could stop, she was talking too much. To which we responded, no, keep talking, we want to hear about this stuff. Outside we sat down at some benches for awhile, and ate some Sun Chips I’d brought so as to sober up a bit. We went on to Preston, where the woman seemed not so nice, so we decided to head out to Ferrari. Mendler decided to prank call the lady, and started asking questions, throwing in “bitch,” “cunt,” “dirty whore,” etc. under his breath. Rome and I were laughing so hard I almost crashed the car. She apparently caught on to the ruse, and he hung up.
We went on to the Ferrari-Carano Winery. The grounds were nice, they had a cool garden, but not 400 man-hours a week worth. It seemed very commercial and overpriced inside, and by now we were pretty hungry, so we headed out. To Santa Rosa and the bars. As we wanted lunch, we went to Third Street. I got these chicken tacos with garlic fries that were pretty good (the tacos), along with a Cherry Ale, which wasn’t so much. We wanted to check out the Russian River Brew Co., so walked over there too. Rome was done drinking, so Mendler and I each tried a beer. Mendler tried to order a 10 oz., but the bartender said it was happy hour and a pint cost the same, so he went with that. I again wanted to try the fruity beer, but they were out, so I had a wheat beer instead. Better than the Cherry, but still nothing special. Rome became our driver, and we headed back down the 12, only planning to stop at the free wineries at the end of the route. The last one was called Roche, but they said they were closed when we got there (like 5:35), and we should head back up a little to Cline, which was open till 6. So we drove back up to Cline. There they had a whole list of wines to taste, all free, and then a back side to the list, special reserve stuff that cost extra. So we just stuck with the like 10 on the front. The lady was pretty nice and went into detail about where the grapes for each came from, etc. She said her favorite of that side of the list was the Cold Climate Syrah (meaning the grapes were from a slightly cooler area of the Sonoma Valley, since Syrah grapes are very thick-skinned and can handle cooler temps). I agreed with her that it was the best on that side, and she was so happy she suggested we try a bit of one of the fancier syrahs from the back. I got a bottle of the Cold Climate, which cost $16. We then headed down to Carmel (-by-the-Sea) and our friend Seth’s father Bob’s house. Seth is the part-time paparazzo, who grew up with Mike.
On the way to Bob’s, we passed through Marina, and stopped at English Ales, Rome and Mendler’s favoritest brewery anywhere, I guess for their porter in particular. I was driving and passed up the chance to drink more (esp. since we were coming back the next day). We headed on to Bob’s, where we were received by him and his excited dog, Buddy. The original plan was to maybe go out and get some dinner after dropping our things off, but we ended up talking to Bob way too long (primarily about his kids, their athletic prowess, the elder ones going to college, and subsequent searches for happiness and goals in life).
Friday morning we got up and drove into Monterey, as Bob had two guest passes to the aquarium that he generously offered to us. The place costs $25, or $23 (wow a whole $2 off) for students. It was pretty neat, though we just missed the great white who had gone on hunger strike and was thus released. We went on to R.G. Burgers, whose Carmel branch Rome and Mendler had been to. Very good burger, though not quite up to par with Crunchy’s at Michigan State (at least my idealized memory of Crunchy’s). They also had sweet potato fries, though I had to pay $2 more for them. We headed back to English Ales, where I tried the Big Sur Blonde, which was quite good, and the Fat Lip Amber, which wasn’t anything special. Mendler got his trip’s worth by taking in 4 porters. We then headed back to Bob’s to chill for a bit before heading back to Monterey for the Jazz Fest. Grounds tickets were $40, and arena seats were more, but the other two said they weren’t worth it. So we tried to see if there was anyone scalping tickets for less than $40. We found some old-ish ladies who were trying to sell arena seats, and talked them down to $40, instead of the $57 face value. But that was only 2 tix. Rome considered trying to pass himself off as 18 in order to get the kids rate, but we found a lady who had like 6 arena tickets that she was selling for “half price”, so we ended up with one arena ticket for $30. We wandered around, Mendler bought a sausage from some white African Communists. Don’t ask me what that means. Apparently they had some flyers in years past. Rome was psyched to see Matt Wilson, this drummer who played with a group called Arts and Crafts. Some of their stuff was a bit boring, but I liked some others, including a song he wrote for a rutabaga festival in Illinois (he’s from West-Central IL). After that show, we went to see the Christian McBride Band. Which was really good. McBride’s a bassist, and played with a drummer, saxophonist, and keyboardist, who had 4 keyboards that he alternated between, usually playing two at once. He told a story about how he re-recorded one of the songs he played. Roy Hargrove (a famous jazz trumpeter), in whose band he had been, called him and said he was watching Lifetime. Apparently this movie had used McBride’s song without his knowledge. They tried to find the producers in order to sue them since they never even asked to use the song, but failed. So he recorded the song again. Somehow thinking that would help. Maybe that wasn’t such a great story. Anyway, after the performance, we headed out and decided just to drive back home instead of having to leave early the next morning. I was down ‘cause this way I could possibly go to the UCLA football game (vs. Arizona). This was about 12:30am, and we made it back by about 5:30. I came close to falling asleep, so Mendler, who had slept a couple hours later than me, took over for the rest of the way. And I slept.
I texted Irene to let her know I could go to the game. She was up, as that’s her thing after drinking the previous night. The rest of her friends refused to wake up, being hungover, so we went without them (after I slept for a few more hours). Irene suggested we go to Porto’s, this Cuban sandwich place in Glendale for lunch. I had the medianoche (MEE-dee-on-oh-CHEE, not -KEE as I had thought) sandwich, Dexter Morgan’s favorite in the Dexter series. Pork and beef (I think), with Swiss on a sweet-ish roll. I passed on the mustard-mayo and pickles. But the mustard might have worked. Excellent nonetheless. Not Firestone tri-tip excellent, but still pretty good. It came with some plantain chips, for $3.65. I also got a chicken empanada that was very tasty. Irene got a Cuban sandwich, which was the same as the medianoche, but regular bread (so not as good), and a tamale and potato ball, which were ok, but not something I’d order again. We headed out to the game, which was not so great. Our offense is terrible, and we lost 31-10. The one UCLA TD was earned by the defense, on a fumble recovery.
Mike Rome, who was an undergrad and then tech in my lab, and Jordan Mendler, a friend of ours, who I met through Rome since they grew up together in Tarzana, left on a road trip Tuesday. Each year, they go up to the Monterey Jazz Fest. This time I came along. We left Tuesday morning and headed up to San Luis Obispo. First stop was at Firestone Grill, where we had amazing tri-tip BBQ beef sandwiches. They cost like $8.50, but had a ton of beef. And the BBQ sauce was kinda sweet, very tasty. We shared a basket of fries, but couldn't finish them. Guess you need 4 guys to share.
We then headed up the 101 to Paso Robles and the Firestone Brewery (I think unrelated to the Grill, but this is the one that supplies the Firestone Pale Ale and Double Barrel Ale that is sold throughout CA). They only have factory tours at 3pm on Saturdays, so we missed out, but got to drink mugs of beer for $6, along with free pretzels and mustard. I had some Little Opal, this light beer that was only 3.5% alcohol. Good, as I was driving. But we all had trouble finishing after our lunch. We then headed back to SLO for the night, to check out the bars. This was Tuesday night, so probably not the biggest bar night. But there were still quite a few people at this place called the Frog and Peach. $2 pints, although the first was $5. This band, Sad Lisa, started playing, although only after they got their pitcher of beer. By then we were slightly hungry again (this was hours later), so we went to Woodstock's Pizza, which our friend who went to SLO raves about. It was decent. Happy hour, so the beer was actually cheaper than at the bar. I got a pint of Amber Bock for $2. Good St. Louis beer, I think made by Budweiser. We walked around more and found a more chill bar down at the end of the crowded part of Higuera Street. Rome couldn't finish his beer. Party foul.
The next morning, we stopped at the Firestone brewery again. It was really more like noon by that time. And then drove up the 101 to Rohnert Park, where we were staying. We didn’t get there until 5:30. Once we got there we learned that all the wineries close by 6. Mendler looked up breweries and found this place, Dempsey’s, in Petaluma, back down the 101 a bit. We drove down there, and the GPS told us to turn into this strip mall, which we didn’t believe. But it turned out to be correct. We had some beer there-Rome and Mendler this stout, I had a red. Not bad. We then went to a Chinese place called Chopsticks. Not bad. The most interesting thing was a painting in the bathroom of a Chinese lady in a one-piece bathing suit with huge hands and tiny feet. There were these guys in the background leering at her.
Thursday was wine day. We left Rohnert Park and drive down the 101 to the 12 to go to some wineries. The first one we stopped at was this mansion called Ledson. Apparently this guy had begun building a mansion to live in, and then decided to turn it into a winery. It was kinda expensive. Mendler asked if there was any free tasting, so the guy gave us a sample of their Chardonnay, but said that was all he could give for free. Mendler suggested we were kinda cheap, and asked if there were any free wine tasting places around. The guy suggested a few. He also recommended going to check out Ferrari-Carano Winery in Dry Creek Valley, as they apparently put 400 hours of labor a week into the upkeep of their grounds. We then asked about breweries, and the guy and another got into a heated argument over which was better-Russian River Brewing Co. or the Third Street Aleworks, in nearby Santa Rosa. They agree that Third had better food, but were split on which had better beer. So we headed back north to the Dry Creek area. Somehow we input W. Dry Creek Road instead of Dry Creek Road, and couldn’t find the place. But that was good, because we found some other places. First we stopped at Zichichi. It looked kinda ghetto from the road, but was relatively nice and modern. Zichichi charged $5 for tasting 4 wines, so we tried it. Some guy was talking to him about awards, and Zichichi suggested that some awards aren’t really worth much. Some guy in Italy had faked a whole winery entry in some competition, and won a few awards. Without ever sending any wine. Apparently almost all of Zichichi’s stuff was sold out already, but he took us into the pressing room to sample some not-quite-finished reds. Rome thought his petite syrah was great. I couldn’t really tell. However, the grapes they had in crates outside were very good. We went on to the Raymond Burr Winery. It was free. And we could tell not as good. We asked the guy there about other free or cheap places, and he suggested Bella and Preston down the road. We headed over, passing by Preston, and stopped at Bella. They had a building that was just bathrooms. The tasting room was in a cave. Mendler again took the lead and asked about free wine, as we’re poor college kids. The woman said it was $5, but quickly decided to let us have at it for free. An older couple that had already paid was not terribly pleased. We had about 6 reds there, including a dessert wine that was really sweet, but I still liked. The woman kept explaining the wines to us, and then at one point suggested she could stop, she was talking too much. To which we responded, no, keep talking, we want to hear about this stuff. Outside we sat down at some benches for awhile, and ate some Sun Chips I’d brought so as to sober up a bit. We went on to Preston, where the woman seemed not so nice, so we decided to head out to Ferrari. Mendler decided to prank call the lady, and started asking questions, throwing in “bitch,” “cunt,” “dirty whore,” etc. under his breath. Rome and I were laughing so hard I almost crashed the car. She apparently caught on to the ruse, and he hung up.
We went on to the Ferrari-Carano Winery. The grounds were nice, they had a cool garden, but not 400 man-hours a week worth. It seemed very commercial and overpriced inside, and by now we were pretty hungry, so we headed out. To Santa Rosa and the bars. As we wanted lunch, we went to Third Street. I got these chicken tacos with garlic fries that were pretty good (the tacos), along with a Cherry Ale, which wasn’t so much. We wanted to check out the Russian River Brew Co., so walked over there too. Rome was done drinking, so Mendler and I each tried a beer. Mendler tried to order a 10 oz., but the bartender said it was happy hour and a pint cost the same, so he went with that. I again wanted to try the fruity beer, but they were out, so I had a wheat beer instead. Better than the Cherry, but still nothing special. Rome became our driver, and we headed back down the 12, only planning to stop at the free wineries at the end of the route. The last one was called Roche, but they said they were closed when we got there (like 5:35), and we should head back up a little to Cline, which was open till 6. So we drove back up to Cline. There they had a whole list of wines to taste, all free, and then a back side to the list, special reserve stuff that cost extra. So we just stuck with the like 10 on the front. The lady was pretty nice and went into detail about where the grapes for each came from, etc. She said her favorite of that side of the list was the Cold Climate Syrah (meaning the grapes were from a slightly cooler area of the Sonoma Valley, since Syrah grapes are very thick-skinned and can handle cooler temps). I agreed with her that it was the best on that side, and she was so happy she suggested we try a bit of one of the fancier syrahs from the back. I got a bottle of the Cold Climate, which cost $16. We then headed down to Carmel (-by-the-Sea) and our friend Seth’s father Bob’s house. Seth is the part-time paparazzo, who grew up with Mike.
On the way to Bob’s, we passed through Marina, and stopped at English Ales, Rome and Mendler’s favoritest brewery anywhere, I guess for their porter in particular. I was driving and passed up the chance to drink more (esp. since we were coming back the next day). We headed on to Bob’s, where we were received by him and his excited dog, Buddy. The original plan was to maybe go out and get some dinner after dropping our things off, but we ended up talking to Bob way too long (primarily about his kids, their athletic prowess, the elder ones going to college, and subsequent searches for happiness and goals in life).
Friday morning we got up and drove into Monterey, as Bob had two guest passes to the aquarium that he generously offered to us. The place costs $25, or $23 (wow a whole $2 off) for students. It was pretty neat, though we just missed the great white who had gone on hunger strike and was thus released. We went on to R.G. Burgers, whose Carmel branch Rome and Mendler had been to. Very good burger, though not quite up to par with Crunchy’s at Michigan State (at least my idealized memory of Crunchy’s). They also had sweet potato fries, though I had to pay $2 more for them. We headed back to English Ales, where I tried the Big Sur Blonde, which was quite good, and the Fat Lip Amber, which wasn’t anything special. Mendler got his trip’s worth by taking in 4 porters. We then headed back to Bob’s to chill for a bit before heading back to Monterey for the Jazz Fest. Grounds tickets were $40, and arena seats were more, but the other two said they weren’t worth it. So we tried to see if there was anyone scalping tickets for less than $40. We found some old-ish ladies who were trying to sell arena seats, and talked them down to $40, instead of the $57 face value. But that was only 2 tix. Rome considered trying to pass himself off as 18 in order to get the kids rate, but we found a lady who had like 6 arena tickets that she was selling for “half price”, so we ended up with one arena ticket for $30. We wandered around, Mendler bought a sausage from some white African Communists. Don’t ask me what that means. Apparently they had some flyers in years past. Rome was psyched to see Matt Wilson, this drummer who played with a group called Arts and Crafts. Some of their stuff was a bit boring, but I liked some others, including a song he wrote for a rutabaga festival in Illinois (he’s from West-Central IL). After that show, we went to see the Christian McBride Band. Which was really good. McBride’s a bassist, and played with a drummer, saxophonist, and keyboardist, who had 4 keyboards that he alternated between, usually playing two at once. He told a story about how he re-recorded one of the songs he played. Roy Hargrove (a famous jazz trumpeter), in whose band he had been, called him and said he was watching Lifetime. Apparently this movie had used McBride’s song without his knowledge. They tried to find the producers in order to sue them since they never even asked to use the song, but failed. So he recorded the song again. Somehow thinking that would help. Maybe that wasn’t such a great story. Anyway, after the performance, we headed out and decided just to drive back home instead of having to leave early the next morning. I was down ‘cause this way I could possibly go to the UCLA football game (vs. Arizona). This was about 12:30am, and we made it back by about 5:30. I came close to falling asleep, so Mendler, who had slept a couple hours later than me, took over for the rest of the way. And I slept.
I texted Irene to let her know I could go to the game. She was up, as that’s her thing after drinking the previous night. The rest of her friends refused to wake up, being hungover, so we went without them (after I slept for a few more hours). Irene suggested we go to Porto’s, this Cuban sandwich place in Glendale for lunch. I had the medianoche (MEE-dee-on-oh-CHEE, not -KEE as I had thought) sandwich, Dexter Morgan’s favorite in the Dexter series. Pork and beef (I think), with Swiss on a sweet-ish roll. I passed on the mustard-mayo and pickles. But the mustard might have worked. Excellent nonetheless. Not Firestone tri-tip excellent, but still pretty good. It came with some plantain chips, for $3.65. I also got a chicken empanada that was very tasty. Irene got a Cuban sandwich, which was the same as the medianoche, but regular bread (so not as good), and a tamale and potato ball, which were ok, but not something I’d order again. We headed out to the game, which was not so great. Our offense is terrible, and we lost 31-10. The one UCLA TD was earned by the defense, on a fumble recovery.