Quemores visit Windarra, 6/20-23

After dropping Jesse and Rae at the LA airport, Rich, Sarah and I drove back to Emeryville and Windarra. At the same time, Chris and Kathy Quemore were riding the Coast Starlight north to the Bay Area. At 10:30pm we met them at the train station in Emeryville and brought them home to Windarra.

Tuesday morning we drove up to Napa. Summer had arrived and it was plenty hot. We made a stop at the grocery store for items to fill our picnic basket then on to Castello di Amorosa for a tour and hopefully a chance to get out of the sun and to cool down. After some tasting in the chilled environment of the wine cellar we departed and went to enjoy our picnic. We chose the same spot we had from our previous visit to show Chris and Kathy the view of the valley. A bottle of cool chardonnay from Rutherford Hill topped off the picnic. That evening we watched the movie ‘Bottle Shock’ with Alan Rickman. It brings it home when you have just visited the same location.

Wednesday we took a trip to Sausalito. It was cooler and sitting in the sun was pleasant. After lunch we walked around the town, checking out the shops and the views of San Francisco.

Thursday morning we were up early to catch our tour boat to Alcatraz and Angel Island. Luckily we had booked this on Tuesday as it fills up fast. On the trip over, we caught sight of Oracle’s training catamarans. This sailboat is only 45 feet long. The boats they will race for the America’s Cup will be 72 feet. The black sails are distinctive and the boats are definitely fast.

None of us had been to Alcatraz before so it was fun to walk around. As part of the tour you get an individual audio system which tells you more about the prison, the inmates and what life was like. It must have been hard seeing the city just a short distance away. We boarded a powered catamaran for our trip to Angel Island. The catamaran has solar panels on the roof as well as wind generators to augment the diesel engines. It even has variable frequency generators, similar to the new 787s. Angel Island once served as the Ellis Island on the west coast for immigrants from Asia as well as being a military base. Now it is protected and folks may visit and picnic on the island. There is a nice anchorage with mooring buoys that we hope to visit later in July. We rode a tram around the island for a 1 hour tour. The road around the island afforded some spectacular views of San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge. We were lucky that it was clear and fog free, which is not typical for this time of year. After the ride back we dropped Chris and Kathy at their hotel near the San Francisco airport so they may catch an early flight back to Tennessee.

We have been looking forward to their visit for a long time and we were glad to have this opportunity.