Food Tourism

While my wife got her spa treatment, I indulged in my own relaxation exercise: I went wine-tasting.  If you have a chance to go out wine tasting from Calistoga, I recommend that you do it the way I did: on a "cruiser" bicycle rented from the Calistoga Bikeshop.  They'll even call ahead and make appointments at the "appointment only" wineries for you.  There's little traffic in the farm country around Calistoga, and on a bike you don't have to worry that much about how much wine you're consuming.  Also, the scenery is incredibly beautiful (above, cherry trees back a field of trimmed grape vines swimming in wild mustard).

"On our way up to Calistoga, we'll get cheese."

"What?  Sonoma Jack?"

"No, silly.  Handmade artisan Portuguese cheese. In Santa Rosa."

"In Santa Rosa?"

"Yeah.   There's this little cheese factory there run by some folks from the Azores.  They make one cheese, but apparently it's really good."

"In Santa Rosa?"

"Yes, in Santa Rosa."

"Huh.  What's the cheese called?"

"Hmmm ... let me see.  'Queijo cheese'."

"Dear, 'queijo' means 'cheese' in Portuguese."

Me and my fellow geeks enjoyed tasting all of the Greis wines.

If you come into Bolzano by train from the North, one of the first things you see will be vine-covered hillsides surrounding the valley.  South Tyrol (the valley) is an ancient wine-growing region, special for its large variety of slopes, soils and altitudes for growing wine grapes.   Many of these vines belong to Kellerei Bozen, or at least to the grower cooperative which supplies their grapes.  This winery has two labels: St. Magdalener and Greis.