A Day Trip to Napa

Apparently all I do these days is go wine tasting. For a person that admittedly doesn't have the most refined palette for wine, I find this slightly amusing. But as you know, during my last weekend in Geneva I went wine tasting and during my 22 hour layover in Boston I also had a quick wine tasting moment. So here I am my second full day back home and I'm in the Napa Valley wine tasting.
I went with my brother, my niece Malayah, and her mom MJ (who I've known since I was eight years old) to this winery in St Helena called V Sattui. The place was really nice and the lady who did our wine tasting was really nice and super funny. I was a little congested from allergies, which I think is why I liked the super fruity and girly wines more than usual that day. After tasting about 15 wines, my brother and MJ both bought a case of wine each.

 I was pretty hungary after consuming all that wine, since unlike my pretentious brother I did actually swallow all my wine. Luckily, the place that MJ chose had a picnic bbq area. MJ and my brother ordered quite a spread with oysters, bruschetta, shrimp, and pork ribs. We paired that with some white wine, a baguette of Acme bread, and a couple of cheeses we had tried at the cheese tasting. It all hit the spot as we sit in the warm Napa sun. 

It's been rather exciting being able to finally drink legally in America. Although I've been drinking in America for awhile now (I know, big shocker) and I've been drinking legally in Europe all semester, it still wasn't quite as exciting as my new power as a 21-year-old. So my first drink on the plane was a white wine, I went to a wine tasting and went out in my 22 hours in Boston, I had a mimosa after breakfast my first day in San Francisco, and then I went wine tasting yesterday. You know what that means? I just have to go out today or else I'll break my LEGAL streak! Tell you about it later. 

Higher Grounds

I spent my first night and day in my old neighborhood of Glen Park, where I grew up in San Francisco. After awakening at 5am and just lounging in bed for the next five hours, the crew (my brother, my niece and me) all headed down the hill to the 'village' to get breakfast. We went to my favorite breakfast spot when I was little, Higher Ground. Back in the day, I would just get a basic cheese omelette with a Mexican hot chocolate (you just add cinnamon), but these days I'm older and have a much more mature palette. So this time, I decided to actually try what Higher Grounds is known for: their savory crepes. I think the crepe I got was Alla Toscana? It has a large variety of cheeses, egg, and spinach. I rather enjoyed it. I also got a large fresh-squeezed orange juice that was only like $3, which I'm pretty sure is a good deal (or I'm still confused by Geneva prices)

I completely recommend Higher Grounds. Recently, Glen Park has been on the rise and the 'village' has gotten a bunch of snooty new restaurants and markets. But Higher Grounds has been around since I was little and Glen Park was still an area of the city people didn't know how to get to (no seriously, the amount of friends' parents that got lost dropping me off). So this isn't like those yuppie brunch spots that are littered around San Francisco (although don't get me wrong, I do love those). Instead, Higher Grounds is an authentic unpretentious family owned breakfast spot that will probably be around longer than all the new computer geeks who just moved into the neighborhood. What I should mention though is that because it's so authentic and unpretentious, They don't take credit cards and there's no wifi. So bring your cash and bring a book if you're planning on sticking around to enjoy the rustic ambiance.

After breakfast, we headed down a couple doors to pop into Chenery Park and say hi to the owner Joe. My brother automatically went to the bar and made us all some mimosas and we all chatted as they prepared for the graduation party that they were having that afternoon. Back in the day, Chenery Park used to be the fancy restaurant in the neighborhood. These days, it's pretty much at the same fancy level as every other restaurant in town besides the old chinese restaurant, mexican taqueria, and the diner. If I go back before I head back to the east coast, I'll snap some pics and tell you allll about it.

Istanbul (Not Constantinople)

My last weekend trip of my semester abroad was to Istanbul, Turkey. Although I don't think it's the traditional European destination, it was one of the main places I wanted to visit during my semester abroad. Apparently, the rest of the Geneva crew wanted to see it too because I went with a group of five other GSGers and two other groups had already gone for spring break. By the end of the semester, all of but one of us made a little trip to good ol' Constantinople.

Istanbul was so different from all the places I had been during the rest of the semester. The first two days reminded me of my summer in Jerusalem actually. It was pretty reminiscent of that summer when I went to the Grand Bazaar, the merchants were extremely aggressive, just like they were in the Old City of Jerusalem. Although, I didn't feel quite as unsafe as I occasionally did in the Old City. But I just think that's because it was constantly jam-packed, while the Old City had some empty corridors. Also, we had a guy this time. Sadly, that does make a difference sometimes.

Generally, my time in Istanbul was very enjoyable. I finally got to see the Hagia Sofia, which I had heard about since Western Civ at UHS.

We saw the beautiful mosaics of the Blue Mosque and got some pretty cute photos with our headscarves.

Ventured over to the largest mosque in Istanbul....

Wandered through the Grand Bazaar and bought plenty of presents for the family back home....

Ventured over to Asia for a quick stroll...

Watched some dervishes whirl...

Ate some kebabs...and then some more kebabs

Out of everything, I think one of the coolest experiences from our time in Istanbul was sleeping on the roof of our hostel. Our hostel was located in the old area of Istanbul, right by the Hagia Sofia and the Blue Mosque. So close in fact, that you could see the Hagia Sofia from the roof. It was so cool to wake up to the 5am call to prayer and then later watch the sunrise behind the Hagia Sofia.

Honey, I'm HOMEEE

I just got back to San Francisco last night. Although it's a beautiful 70 degrees outside, I'm mainly stuck inside because I came down with a cold during my 32 hour journey home from Geneva. I'll tell you about my last weeks in Geneva, my journey, and my quick stay at home later (maybe even today). 

I did have a little drive around the city, along the beach, through the presidio, etc to get back in the swing of driving. I really do love this city, and can't wait to recover and have some little San Francisco adventures.

This picture is from Tank Hill, which is down the block from my house. It's actually from a post I did way back in 2010! 

Classy Day Drinking: Les Caves Ouvertes

On Saturday, we went on this magical wine tasting adventure: les Caves Ouvertes. This was the 26th year of this wine tasting event, which invites amateurs to try a large variety of wine from the vineyards surrounding Geneva. It included free transportation (both train to the countryside and buses from vineyard to vineyard) as well as unlimited wine tasting for the whole day for a mere 5CHF. Now, if you know anything about Geneva or Switzerland, that is a crazy good deal. A single bus ticket in Geneva in 3CHF, probably a ticket to the countryside roundtrip is at least 30CHF, and the vineyards? Well, I'm not sure if wine tasting is normally free (I believe places in Napa are), but the difference between this and that is that they are very aware that everyone at this event is getting drunk and not exactly buying their favorite case of wine after the visit.

The event was a far bigger deal than I had realized when Alice had mentioned the event on our Facebook group. I thought it would be similar to our wine tasting adventure in Montpellier, which was very small (just the group of us), sitting around a table, pretending to taste the horse or raspberry in the wine. In other words, I thought it would be nice, but snobby.

However, this was far more of a party. When we got on the train, the whole thing was jam packed as groups of friends yammered away. Exiting the train, hoards of people drifted towards the vineyards where we found an already packed tent full of wine. At almost every stop, we met some drunk new friends who had certainty taken advantage of the unlimited wine situation.
For me, the best part of the whole adventure was being able to see the countryside and vineyards outside of Geneva. The last time I wandered around Switzerland, there was still snow on the ground. But this time the scenery was so lush and green with beautiful blue skies. Well, beautiful blue skies until our last stop, when it started pouring....

After we took the train home, we stopped by Chez Ma Cousine to get dinner. My family friends in the area said it was by far the best deal in town and I have to agree. 14CFH for half a chicken, salad, and potatoes wouldn't even be a bad deal in the US. Our tipsy sells devoured all our food but I left my wine glass untouched and offered it up to the table. After all that wine all day, I didn't think I could handle anymore. 

In general, the day was quite the success. I spent a grand total of 25CHF for the whole day including a little train ride, wine all day and a half chicken dinner. I'm pretty sure that's a good deal everywhere! As per usual, this experience had inspired me to do something back home. And now I really want to drag my brother to Napa during my two weeks back home now that I can drink legally in the states! 

PS. Check out my friend Faith's blog! She went on this adventure too and has muuuch better pictures than me (and sometimes I steal photos of myself from her blog because I hate asking people to take pictures of me)