A Little town called Solvang!!!

One of the things I did Easter weekend was celebrate my friend Trents birthday with a little wine tasting in Solvang.
Solvang is a super cute swedish town about 2 hours up the 101 from L.A. It's not too far, and its such a nice drive along the coast.

We left early on Saturday morning and met up in the downtown area of Solvang. There are fun little bars, restaurants and shops that you could spend the whole afternoon at. We met up in front of the bike rental shop. There were 8 of us in the group, we rented two tandem bikes, and 4 mountain bikes. We stopped and had a great lunch at Panino. They had really amazing sandwiches. We considered the more cost effective Subway across the park, but decided we couldn't pass up a brie and turkey sandwich. We were all very happy with our selections.

Then we got on the bikes... tandem bikes take some getting used to. The first leg, the hubby was in front and I was in back. The person in back has no control over anything, you just have to trust the other rider, and focus on not shifting a lot of weight around. I had complete faith in the hubby, as he was the one in front. Later on I got to ride in the front... completely different experience, you can feel every little move the person in back makes. A bit scary but once you get the hang of it, very much fun. We went to 3 wineries and two tasting rooms:

Our first stop was Buttonwood Farms, lovely outdoor white wine tasting area.

Our next stop was The Ballard Inn. This has to be the cutest hotel/Inn I have ever seen. I would love to come back and stay here for a romantic weekend. Plus, the wines we tasted had to be my favorite, the wines were a little more expensive, but I think 5 of us bought a bottle here... so it's well worth a try.

Our next stop was Lincourt. We were feeling great by this time. We did our tasting outside on their huge porch overlooking their vineyard. It was lovely. We ended up buying a bottle in the middle of the tasting and hanging out.

Our last winery was Rideau. This was a gorgeous winery. The tasting room was big, but crowded. We did our tasting, along with olive oil and other cracker spreads, and took a bottle outside. There were picnic tables and chairs outside. We spent a lot of time just hanging out, it was really lovely. We ended up buying one of their spreads, it was the pesto and pink peppercorn spreads, it was yummy.

After this last winery, we headed back to return the bikes. The ride back was sooooo much easier. I guess on the way to the wineries the road had a slight incline, so it was difficult. But we made it. No falling over or crashing. We returned the bikes, and headed to our last tasting. Presidio, it was a fun tasting. It was a bit crowded as it was open a bit later then most of the other tasting rooms. They had an amazing Reisling, and they discount your purchase.

We had a great time. I recommend a weekend trip to anyone wanting to get away, and try something new, or not so new if you are like me and love wine.