• Breakfast: 2 boiled eggs, banana
• Snack: Half a banana, wine
• Lunch: Meats, cheeses, tomatoes, olives, cheeses, cheese
• Snack: Wine, wine, wine
• Dinner: At Slanted Door – 1 x fresh spring roll, 1 x crispy spring roll, cellophane noodles with crab, glass wine, coffee with milk
• Snack: Cheese

Meals today were mostly of the grape and cheese variety. 

One of the nicest things to do when you’re visiting San Francisco is to head off into the hills for an afternoon of wine tasting – Sonoma and Napa Valley being the most convenient areas from the city.  You can hire a limo, join a group, or cajole (bully) a friend into being the designated driver (sucker). Blissful hours are spent wandering through vineyards, sipping on delectable vintages and trying to decide which of the cheeses you bought at the farmer’s market will go best with the 2010 Chardonnay you’ve just tasted.

Sounds idyllic, right? It is.

But days like this are a NIGHTMARE for anyone trying to eat healthily.

1. Wine is obviously high in calories.

2. Cheese goes amazingly well with wine. And cheese is also high in calories and potentially other not-so-healthy things like trans-fat.

3. When you have one glass of delicious wine, you want another. And another. And sure why don’t we buy a bottle for the limo.

4. You don’t drink enough water, so you’re thirsty, so you drink more wine.

5. At the end of the day you’re slightly buzzed so all you want is to eat carbs.

As a result of all of the above, my day was not the healthiest. So, I think I probably failed the Wine Tour challenge. But what are you supposed to do? Decline the invite and sit at home drinking green juices? Actually, that’s probably exactly what you’re supposed to do if you’re really dedicated to living a 100% healthy lifestyle. But, I still want to do fun things and live the full SF experience. I just need to be as healthy as possible.

So, what would the ideal healthy wine tour look like to me? I think it would mean going to wine country, doing the tastings, being able to choose your own healthy lunch (or bring your own picnic), not having any extra wine, drinking enough water and going home to a healthy, home-cooked meal.

Lesson learned.

But it was still a lovely day and I’m glad I was able to give my parents that experience.

As regards the details of what we did – we joined a tour group run by Valley Wine Tours in Sonoma. We visited some lovely wineries – my favourite being Jacuzzi, which had more Italian type wines. I did find an amazing Sauvignon Blanc in Bartholomew Park Winery as well. We had a lunch stop at Larson Family Winery, which was nice. They have dogs you can play with (I say play, but all they want is for you to feed them) and some fun lawn games to play. The tour itself was only OK I would say. I’ve heard rave reviews about the owner Bob, but we had a different driver.

Dinner that night was in Slanted Door on the Embarcadero, which has won a few awards. Tasty Vietnamese food and the views of the Bay Bridge at night are spectacular.

Tasting the wine

Lawn games at Larson Family Winery

Views of the Bay Bridge at night