Route 192 and a winery

Since we are in California, we decided to visit a winery and chose one that sounded promising near Santa Ynez. To get there we could use the freeway or Route 192 which we enjoyed yesterday so we drove along it again.

But first, Marianne's breakfast on a bagel. Carpinteria held its avocado festival a week or so ago so they must be grown locally. However Aussies would be disappointed that there was no 'smashed avocado' on the menu.

I had scrambled egg and feta on a bagel in a dish called a B-Eggl.

So we headed out of town again towards the hills on route 192.

There are fields everywhere growing crops. This was interesting for the hoops.

Route 192 is basically a road with lots of curves and a necessarily low speed limit. Both on this trip and yesterday's, we passed radar traps. The speed limit changes constantly so I needed the GPS to tell me how fast I could go.

Every now and then you get a magnificent vista.

Or weird trees and rocks like this.

Orchard.

Eucalyptus trees beside the road.

Interesting church. There was a wedding taking place the day before.

More curves. It may be slow going, but it is faster than a jammed freeway on a weekend.

The day we arrived in the area, the sky was very murky. Yesterday it was somewhat better but today the sky was a wonderful blue.

Prickly pear beside the road.

Interesting bridge crossing.

We stopped at a view point. Presumably bears inhabit the area. 

Because of the traffic, it is difficult to pull over and stop to take photos of the view. Here was our big chance.

These hills and mountains are spectacular. And very dry.

There was a bad fire a few months before. I would not want to live in the area since it is so dry and the insurance premiums have got to be horrendous.

We were puzzled by this cloud formation.

After getting lost a little, we found our winery which was supposed to have interesting gardens. The entrance way looked promising.

View from the parking lot.

Some of the gardens.

We walked into the tasting room. We were offered a flight of six wines for $20 each so we started off with a chardonnay that was fermented in concrete eggs like this one. They are made in France.

After several wines, our hostess suggested we take our glass of wine and go for a walk to look at the view out the back.

And it was a lovely view. There appears to be a horse track in the foreground and behind it is where they grow their syrah grapes.

Horse farms are popular in this area.

We were pleased to finally see some fall leaves. We hope to see plenty more when we get home.

Curious fence.

You could sit out here and enjoy your wine but with a temperature in the high nineties, perhaps not.

Nice wide veranda.

The tasting list. Our hostess added a zinfandel as an extra, I think because we chatted away to her. Apparently she likes Aussies because they are more interested and ask more questions.

My favourites were the viognier and the  2014 reserve syrah.

We had presumed that Bridlewood was a privately owned winery but our hostess told us it was now owned by the giant Gallo. 

And here she is. She has a degree in chemistry and wondering if she should get a wine making degree. The tasting cost $20 each.

When we returned to the car, the thermometer read 111 degrees but it plummeted to 95 when we drove off. The low humidity made the high temperature bearable. Back in Carpinteria it was just 81.

We drove back to the Airbnb via the freeway and Marianne managed to get a couple of photos of the coast.

So it had been a very pleasant outing with some reasonably good wine. I quite like this part of California, but Marianne is less enthused because it is so hot and dry. I think the secret here is to go out in the morning, have a siesta in the hot afternoon and stay outside in the cool of the evening.