Pacific Star is the westernmost winery outpost in the country; its grapes are actually grown farther inland.
PHOTO: Marguerite Thomas
Moseying through MendocinoBy Marguerite ThomasA cap of snow on the Mayacamas Mountains is an unusual sight, even in January, but then the weather has been uncommon in many ways, and that powdered sugar effect on the upper peaks may be just one example of radical and unexpected climatic swings that have influenced growing seasons of late. As I whisk up California Highway 101 toward what is arguably the state's greenest wine region, I marvel at the beauty of the landscape, which gets even more spectacular late in the day as reflections from the setting sun suffuse the snow with delicate shades of rose and lavender.
Because the coastal village of Mendocino is no more than a three-and-a-half-hour drive from the San Francisco airport, I could easily make it out there tonight. I've come west to judge a wine-for-crab competition that is part of the annual Taste Mendocino festivities, but because I'm not expected until the day after tomorrow, I've decided to mosey along through the inland region of Mendocino County before traveling over to the coast.
It's been a few years since my last visit, so I'm eager to reconnect with Mendocino's wine regions and its winemakers, who are considered the most environmentally conscious in California. The county's appellations begin just north of the town of Cloverdale, where Highway 128 splits from 101 to angle off in a northwesterly direction, merging eventually into Coastal Route 1. My intent is to make the return trip to San Francisco via Highway 128, which cuts through three important appellations - Anderson Valley, Mendocino Ridge and Yorkville Highlands - and is lined with numerous wine estates. Many names ring familiar, such as Handley, Husch, Navarro, Meyer Family, Roederer Estate, Scharffenberger, Wattle Creek and Yorkville Cellars. But many others are more newly minted, including Brutocao, Claudia Springs, Greenwood Ridge, Lazy Creek, Le Vin, Maple Creek, Standish and Toulouse, among others.
For the moment, I have set a course due north on Highway 101 through the Sanel Valley, Ukiah Valley and Redwood Valley appellations (Potter Valley lies farther inland, at the headwaters of the Russian River's east fork). The first major stop after crossing from Sonoma County into southern Mendocino County is Hopland, a tiny town that retains the feel of Gold Rush days. In its center, a colorful mural depicting the Wild West on the façade of Lawson's Station greets visitors, which in no way prepares me for the luxuriousness of the hotel's seven guest rooms.
The lavishly furnished, spacious suite I check into includes a comfortable sitting room with a gas fireplace that lends a cozy ambience. A spa tub in the vast bathroom is capacious enough to hold an entire swim team.
While there's still some daylight left, I head outdoors to explore the town. My first stop is at the Solar Living Center, a 12-acre renewable energy and sustainable living demonstration site. This non-profit institute's mission is to promote sustainable living through environmental education. Founded in 1998, it has become, with 200,000 visitors annually, the most visited attraction in Mendocino, but on this bleak weekday in January, only a handful of people are milling around. After browsing through the center's store (where I buy some herbal mothballs), I walk up the road to Sip, a tasting room and wine shop, where 18 of its 140 Mendocino wines are available for tasting seven days per week.
Owner Bernadette Byrne happily shares her encyclopedic knowledge of Mendocino wines, gastronomy and local beers. Among the wines she pours for me ($5 for up to six generous tastes), I am immediately captivated by an almost Sancerre-like Saracina 2006 Sauvignon Blanc ($22) with its lime, grapefruit and wet pebble properties. Saracina was founded in 2001 by John Fetzer (former CEO of Fetzer Vineyards, which was sold to Brown-Forman in 1992) with the goal of making relatively small amounts of wine (10,000 cases) that vividly showcase the varieties in which Mendocino excels. I am also impressed by his second label, Atrea THE CHOIR 2006 ($20), a classically styled roussanne/viognier blend redolent of peach and honeysuckle.
Among the other memorable wines I sample at Sip are the lush and expansive Patianna 2005 Sauvignon Blanc (made from organically grown grapes that exhibit facets of honeydew melon and citrus; $18); a generous Toulouse Estate 2004 Pinot Noir (tons of cherry fruit and toasty oak; $40); and an opulent Eaglepoint Ranch 2005 Petite Sirah (dense, dark berry fruit, plus a hefty dose of spice and pepper; $26). The latter is the result of a partnership between John Scharffenberger (think California sparkling wine pioneer and artisan chocolate maker) and Mendocino grower/vintner Casey Hartlip.
I am so infatuated by their Petite Sirah that when I spot an Eaglepoint Ranch 2003 Grenache on the wine list at Patrona - a fine little bar and bistro with an extensive cellar - I order it to go with a flatbread heaped with succulent, locally foraged, wild black trumpet mushrooms.
The evening began with an order of duck liver paté paired with a Paul Dolan 2006 Chardonnay, an elegant wine with pear and lemony components. Dolan is a fourth-generation vintner (his grandfather, Edmund Rossi, ran Italian Swiss Colony) and former Fetzer winemaster. Earlier in the day, while perusing the stock at Sip, Bernadette Byrne had observed that the extended Fetzer family's long and influential presence in Mendocino continues to expand (within the family itself, ten of the eleven Fetzer siblings are involved in winegrowing in one way or another). It seems that the basic precept among all of them is sustainability. "We want to make a difference in this community," Dolan says.
The morning dawns gray and damp, but warmer than yesterday, and the snow has all but vanished from the mountaintops. At the Bluebird Café, across the street from Lawson's Station, I dig into a hearty Mendocino Scramble (eggs with cheddar cheese, onions and spinach). By the time I check out of the hotel and head north, a low-lying fog has crept in to drape the moss-covered oaks in ghostly fringe. I soar past wineries just north of Hopland: McDowell, McNab Ridge, Graziano. Next I spot Jeriko, established in 1997 by Danny Fetzer, who produces a top-notch brut sparkler, as well as Cabernet and Chardonnay, all from organically grown grapes. Then comes Saracina (which boasts the only cave, blasted out of the hillside, in Mendocino), followed by Jepson, Nelson Family Vineyards and Eaglepoint. I had hoped that some of these tasting rooms might be ready for business by 10 a.m., but because it is a dreary winter day in the middle of a dead week, I can hardly fault them for not cracking their doors quite this early.
Luckily, the Grace Carpenter Hudson Museum is open when I roll into Ukiah. Hudson, whose career spanned the years between 1891 and 1936, is nationally recognized as one of America's most accomplished painters of American Indians. I spend a good hour contemplating her sensitive oil portraits of Pomo Indians, which are rendered with such realism I almost expect the subjects to speak. (The Pomon people, who traditionally lived in villages in Sonoma, Mendocino and Lake counties, most likely formed the densest population of native peoples anywhere in North America; the descendants of those who survived the wrenching cultural disruption of white encroachment now form a vital part of the community here.)
I while away so much time browsing through the paperbacks at the Mendocino Book Company that before I know it, it's noon. I dash over to Oco Time, a few blocks away, where I have a lunch date with Alydia Atkins, the project manager for the Mendocino County Promotional Alliance. As we savor bento boxes filled with grilled salmon, yellowfin avocado roll, Japanese pickles and other little epicurean treats tucked jewel-like into the lacquered compartments, Atkins shares a smattering of Mendocino factoids with me. She confirms that Mendocino County is officially the greenest wine region in the United States with (proportionally) more biodynamic and organic acreage under vine that anywhere in the country. On a related green note, she reports that Parducci is the first carbon-neutral winery in the United States. She also explains that while the Anderson Valley's cool coastal climate is perfect for (and famous for) growing gewürztraminer and pinot noir, inland, in Redwood and Potter valleys, summer temperatures can reach 102 degrees, so it is in this part of Mendo, as the locals call it, that cabernet sauvignon and zinfandel flourish. Grapevines are only part of the scenery here, though. Other types of commercial agriculture (exclusive of marijuana, allegedly the No. 1 crop) include stone fruits and walnuts, along with lucrative livestock, aquaculture and timber industries, too. Spiritualism eclipses capitalism in the nearby town of Talmage, which Atkins tells me is home to the largest Buddhist community - 480 acres known as the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas - in the Western Hemisphere.
I am still turning all of these nuggets over in my mind late in the afternoon as I coast down the hill into Willits, where my first stop is the County Museum. Studying the fascinating collection is not unlike listening to Atkins for its emphasis on the many diverse themes that have shaped the character of this community. My imagination is caught by a display of artifacts related to a spectacular shipwreck off the Mendocino Coast (an event immortalized in Richard Henry Dana's personal narrative Two Years Before the Mast). I marvel, too, at the classic railroad cars on display, and I enjoy listening to the recordings of old-timers from the region who were interviewed for an oral history project ("My grandmother used to accuse her husband of drinking too much," recalls one old gent. "'Giuseppi, if you don't quit drinking so much that wine's going to kill you,' she always said. And, by golly, she was right: When he was 95 years old he died.")
A gentle rain is falling by the time I leave the museum and check into the Baechtel Creek Inn. As luck would have it, I get to spend the rest of the afternoon indoors because I've made an appointment at the inn's spa. This experience proves both fragrant and blissful as spa therapist Tallia Holley first burnishes me with a lavender scrub, then coats me with special solutions of Hungarian chocolate and cherry which, she assures, are superb skin conditioners. In a steam-filled tent, my dermis absorbs this exotic emollient; then, once I'm hosed off, Holley treats me to a curative massage. I emerge from this session utterly relaxed with baby-soft skin and smelling faintly of Hungarian cocoa. I am also fiercely hungry.
The Purple Thistle is a tiny eatery with a commitment to local wines. I order a glass of Naughty Boy Chardonnay 2006, whose fresh, fruity sweetness is a savory partner for prawn and goat cheese crostini, and also for the tantalizing texture and flavors of chef Corey Kelso's poke (raw tuna marinated in soy and sesame). As tired as I am, I defer retiring long enough to indulge in a wedge of the restaurant's decadently rich cheesecake, accompanied by a glass of Greenwood Ridge Late Harvest White Riesling 2006, a lush, honeyed sweetie from a solar-paneled Anderson Valley establishment. I make my way back to the Baechtel Creek Inn, where I fall instantly into a deep sleep - lulled, no doubt, by the soothing aftereffects of the spa treatment and the wines.
Feeling thoroughly refreshed in the morning, I am ready to tackle the drive from Willits to the coast. Route 20 is notoriously narrow and steep, as well as wild and beautiful with its stands of majestic redwoods. After 30 minutes or so of twisting around the hairpin curves, the dense woods part suddenly like a curtain, revealing a wide sky above the ocean. This morning, however, the brooding sky is weighed down with enough gray clouds to make me decide that exploring the Mendocino Botanical Gardens should be done sooner rather than later.
The gardens here are decidedly at their most spectacular in spring and summer, but even in winter they are filled with soft, ethereal colors and sculptural shapes. I am invigorated by the 20-minute walk through the gardens out to the headlands, where the maritime milieu - the smell of briny air, the sound of gulls screeching and the cadence of waves repeating their measured advance-and-retreat against the rocky shore - never fails to thrill.
A couple of miles up the coast, I pull in for lunch at Chapter and Moon, an unpretentious little restaurant strategically located under the bridge that spans Noyo Harbor, just south of Fort Bragg. The place is right on the water - so close, in fact, I can glimpse the lined faces of the crews guiding the fishing boats in and out of the harbor. I sip a glass of 2006 Lazy Creek Gewürztraminer, a sweetly floral, yet impeccably dry wine that proves a fortuitous match for a sandwich of ling cod (which was fresh from the sea that morning) grilled over applewood, then tucked between thick slices of homemade bread.
For dessert, I pop into Cowlick's Ice Cream (where everything is made by hand) for a supremely satisfying blackberry-chocolate chunk cone. A wintry sun has been poking halfheartedly through the clouds all morning, but an inky mass now gathering over the ocean forms a dramatic backdrop at Pacific Star, the westernmost winery outpost in the country (its grapes are actually grown farther inland). In this striking setting overlooking the Pacific, I sample the rich, full-bodied 2003 Chardonnay, a well-structured, pleasantly grainy 2003 Charbono, and 2002 Dad's Daily Red, an engaging blend of carignan, petite sirah, charbono and zinfandel (prices range from $10 to $40).
Just as I turn over the ignition it starts to drizzle, and by the time I reach the Little River Inn a steady rain is falling. But if one has to spend time sheltered indoors during a storm, it's hard to imagine a more appealing setting. The fireplace logs in my room crackle aromatically. The French doors leading to my private deck frame a view across verdant gardens to the scenic cove where foam-fringed waves of turquoise and purple hurl themselves against a shallow beach. At sunset, the angry sea subsides somewhat as a thin vermillion band rises across the horizon to signal at least a momentary truce between land and water. This period of calm following the tempest makes my drive a few miles up the curvy, rain-slicked road to the Ravens Restaurant relatively easy.
Carved into a corner of the Stanford Inn - a handsome glass- and wood-paneled structure surrounded by woodlands and organic vegetable gardens - Ravens offers organic, vegetarian/vegan fare. My carnivorous tastebuds scarcely notice the absence of animal protein in tasty dishes such as Futomaki rolls (savory layers of shiitake mushrooms and green tea-infused brown rice). The sophisticated cuisine is light years removed from the stodgy fodder often associated with vegan dining, and the wine list offers a broad selection of international bottles (though it could use a few more from Mendocino County).
In the morning, rain drums steadily on the roof of the car as I drive the few miles up the coast to Fort Bragg, where I rendezvous with my fellow wine-for-crab judges. The six of us spend the next few hours nibbling fresh cracked Dungeness crab and sampling 47 Mendocino County wines. The entries include sparklers, Chenin Blanc, Pinot Gris and Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Riesling, Viognier and Roussanne, French Colombard, Arneis, Tocai Friuliani and Gewürztraminer, not to mention a variety of white blends. Not all the wines are on equal footing, but many are truly outstanding. One thing this competition clearly demonstrates is the sheer scope of Mendocino's wines and styles, ranging from bone dry and lean, through lush and full bodied. A couple of rosés and Pinot Noirs have been entered in the competition, but whites seem best suited to the sweet and sublimely delicate crab.
Although many of the wines in the lineup provoke lively discussion among the judges, in the end, our choice is unanimous. Still we are somewhat taken aback when the winning wine is revealed to be the modestly priced ($12) Lolonis Ladybug White Old Vines Cuvée III. Blended from organically grown French colombard, sémillon, chenin blanc and chardonnay grapes, this fragrant wine's creamy texture and clean, refreshing impact on the palate provide just the right graceful balance to complement the crabmeat.
Our wrap-up lunch at the Mendo Bistro begins with crab cakes (are any of the judges dismayed at the prospect of consuming yet more crab? Most certainly not!). The first taste reveals why Mendo Bistro's cakes are legendary among Dungeness crab devotees, for chef/owner Nicholas Petti shows exceptional respect for the crustacean's intrinsic delicacy by not overdressing the meat with extraneous fillers or flavors (an aïoli laced with fresh tarragon adds just the right zip).
Down at Noyo Harbor a few hours later, rain is still falling as the 7th annual Cioppino Dinner opens its doors, or more precisely, the flaps to the gigantic tent that has been erected for the occasion. This is a terrific event whose $25 tickets raise money for the Mendocino Coast Clinics (a nonprofit dedicated to providing medical and dental care for all coastal residents regardless of their ability to pay). The Cioppino (a Dungeness crab- and fish-based stew that originated in San Francisco in the late 1800s) is simmering in enormous cauldrons, sending mouthwatering aromas wafting through the tent. Local wines are being poured. The band provides music lively enough to attract scores of dancers, whose enthusiasm is scarcely diminished by the dampness seeping up from the rain-soaked ground. Most of the attendees are locals - families, fishermen, winemakers, a handful of politicos. The mood of the celebrants is tangibly warm and neighborly.
The next morning I am scanning the breakfast menu at the Little River Inn, and while the crab-and-shrimp eggs Benedict is tempting, I skip it in favor of Swedish hotcakes because in a couple of hours I'm going to indulge in more crab at the 9th annual Crab Cake Cook Off. This less-formal competition pits local chefs against each other, and their signature cakes are evaluated by the public (everyone who purchases a ticket can sample all 14 entries and cast a vote).
By mid-afternoon, I am heading back to San Francisco. The good news is that the sun has finally come out. The bad news is that mud slides have shut down Route 128 entirely, so I'll have to retrace my path back through Willits and Ukiah. Anderson Valley will simply have to wait until my next trip west.
Meanwhile, as I speed down 101 toward San Francisco I find myself mulling the momentous sea voyage recorded by Richard Henry Dana in Two Years Before the Mast. That trip (1835-36) was his first exposure to this captivating coast, whose pull lured him back a quarter of a century later.
In an epilogue about his second voyage, he chronicled both the formidable changes he witnessed and the features that had remained exactly as he remembered them. As the author sailed away for the final time, with the shores of California fading in the distance he bade farewell "… to those scenes which, however changed or unchanged, must always possess an ineffable interest for me."
All of us who figuratively followed in his wake are similarly drawn back to this enthralling place again and again, and understand exactly what he meant.
Travel Editor Marguerite Thomas is the author of Touring East Coast Wine Country.
IF YOU GO
Lodging:
Baechtel Creek Inn
101 Gregory Lane, Willits
Phone: (707) 459-9063
www.baechtelcreekinn.com
Chapter and Moon
32150 North Harbor Drive
Noyo Harbor, Fort Bragg
Phone: (707) 962-1643
Little River Inn
7751 North Highway 1, Little River
Phone: (707) 937-5942
www.littleriverinn.com
Dining:
Bluebird Café
13340 South Highway 101, Hopland
Phone: (707) 744-1633
Cowlick's Ice Cream
250B North Main Street, Fort Bragg
Phone: (707) 962-9271
www.cowlicksicecream.com
Lawson's Station
13441 South Highway 101, Hopland
Phone: (707) 744-1977
www.lawsonsstation.com
Mendo Bistro
301 North Main Street, Fort Bragg
Phone: (707) 964-4974
www.mendobistro.com
Oco Time
107 West Church Street, Ukiah
Phone: (707) 462-2714
www.ocotime.com
Patrona
130 West Standley Street, Ukiah
Phone: (707) 462-9181
www.patronarestaurant.com
Ravens Restaurant
at the Stanford Inn
44850 Comptche-Ukiah Road, Mendocino
Phone: (707) 937-5615
www.ravensrestaurant.com
SIP Mendocino Wine Bar
13420 South Highway 101, Hopland
Phone: (707) 744-8375
The Purple Thistle
50 South Main Street, Willits
Phone: (707) 459-4750
Attractions:
Grace Hudson Museum
341 South Main Street, Ukiah
Phone: (707) 467-2836
www.gracehudsonmuseum.org
Mendocino Botanical Gardens
18220 North Highway 1, Fort Bragg
Phone: (707) 964-4352
Mendocino County Museum
400 East Commercial Street, Willits
Phone: (707) 459-2736
www.co.mendocino.ca.us/museum
Solar Living Center
13771 South Highway 101, Hopland
Phone: (707) 744-2017
www.solarliving.org
- MT
