Pinch us --- We Are On the West Coast

OK ... so pinching isn't really necessary.  But sometimes you have a great few days that really "sing" and you wonder how it is that you are so lucky.  The last few of these have been like that.

It started Thursday with a flight to San Francisco.  Paul had been invited to participate in a symposium on cybersecurity being sponsored by the Stanford Journal on International Law.  It was really quite a prestigious invite.  The keynote address was delivered by the Secretary General of the International Telecommunications Union, Dr. Hamadoun Toure.  The ITU is at the center of some political controversy over its efforts to "regulate the internet."   To be honest, Paul went to the meeting very skeptical of the ITU's efforts, but both he and Katy came away rather more impressed with Dr. Toure than before.  He may be wrong, but he seems quite sincere.  That's Paul and Dr. Toure in the photo.

Other attendees at the conference included Howard Schmidt, President' Obama's first CyberCzar and, most amusingly, Marc Rogers, whose claim to fame is that he is the Chief Security Officer at DEFCON.  [For those who don't know, DEFCOM is the uber-Hacker convention, and being chief of security there is a little like being the bouncer at a bordello -- very challenging indeed.].   Overall, the quality of the discourse was high and we enjoyed ourselves greatly.

Of course, no trip to the Bay area would be complete without good food, and the Standford journal did not disappoint.  We had dinner Thursday night at Tamarine which featured a nouvelle Vietnamese tasting menu.  The tamarind shrimp was truly special.  Then on Friday night we went out with colleague/friends, Brian and Cynthia, who took us to their favorite restaurant in San Francisco -- Kokkari.   Kokkari is an upscale Greek place -- Paul had goat stew and Katy had the brazzino.  You can tell we liked it -- we lingered for 3 hours drinking wine, eating and chatting.

But the highlight so far, at least from an intellectual perspective, was breakfast Saturday morning at Coupa Cafe.  Not because the food was good, though it was, or that the coffee was truly excellent, though it was as well.  The highlight was our chance to have a nice engaging chat with Whit Diffie, who we had met earlier at the Standford conference.   If you don't know who he is -- click on the link!  Suffice it to say that if you use on-line banking or credit card services, its secure because of him.  In the cryptology world, he is a big deal.  But he is also, in the end, a really fun fellow to talk to -- full of off-the-wall ideas and stories.  It was just delightful to have breakfast with him.

And now, we are in Napa.  We spent the afternoon at two wineries -- our old favorite, Casa Nuestra, which is a nice "hippie place" and a new one for us -- Alpha Omega.  The AO bottling of ERA (their name) is really special.  We had a chance to taste a barrel sample and ordered 3 bottles on the spot.  That's Katy taking the barrel sample.

Now we are happily ensconced in our delightful B&B (the Oleander House) and relaxing waiting for dinner.

36 Hours in Napa

We've always been winos, in the good sense of the term. So its kind of surprising that we've never been to Napa Valley to go wine tasting. After we dropped Jo off at the airport, we set out to remedy that gap in our travel resume.

We set out in our rented car (a Prius, naturally) across the Bay Bridge and up to Napa. It's actually a remarkably short trip -- maybe 80 minutes with no traffic. But Napa is really a LOT farther away from San Francisco than that, in its atmosphere and culture.

Our first stop was the Napa Valley Lodge -- our hotel for the night. NVL is actually in Yountville, which is a small town about 1/2 way up the valley between Napa in the south and Calistoga in the north. NVL is pleasant enough and has some nice rooms, but its location is a bit challenging since it is literally the first building off the main highway (Rt 29) and through the night we often heard farm trucks shifting the gears as they drove by. On the whole a nice place, but if we go back to Yountville, we'll try somewhere else.

After checking in, it was off for an afternoon of wine tasting. We started at Goosecross Cellars, a small family winery just outside of Yountville. The tasting room is in a small cottage that you get to by driving down a lane through the vineyard. Very cozy place. The day we were there we were alone in the tasting room and had a leisurely time of it. We were blown away by a couple of wines, particularly their Howell Cabernet and so we joined the wine club here. [As a sign of remarkable coincidence, roughly 3 hours after I drafted this sentence, a gift arrived from Goosecross -- one of their Howell's! Now we really are in love]

Then it was on to Casa Nuestra, an even smaller winery just up the road that seems like it is stuck in the 1960s -- all funky and stuff. For example, they had a great Tinto wine that is "field blend" meritage. In other words, the proportion of different grapes reflects what is grown, not some calculated mix. This year's Tinto had a great deep taste. We also liked their dry Riesling. But what really knocked our socks of was the Zinfandel. We went back into the barrel rooms and got a barrel tasting -- they've never done a Zin before, but this one sure had power. We bought the next to last case and .. .yes, joined their wine club too!

Third and last stop was the Peju Winery -- far and away the most elegant winery we went to, but also the most commercial. They had 8 tasting tables up and gave us some light pours of the cheap stuff. We stuck around afterwards and made them give us some of their reserves -- we especially liked their 50/50 Cab Sauv/Cab Franc blend. If this were our first stop we'd probably not have bought anything, but we were a bit light headed by this point, so we ordered a few bottles anyway.

Then it was back to Yountville. We hadn't gotten into the French Laundry (nearly impossible) so we "settled" for Bistro Jeanty down the street. The food was exceedingly good and surprisingly reasonable in price. It was a traditional bistro fare (boudin, steak fritte, etc.) which was a bit heavy on our stomachs after the wine tasting -- but the tastes were great. If I had to do it over again, I'd have skipped the Cassaoulet, not because of how it tasted but just because it was so heavy.

The next morning was wonderful. We got up early for a walk, bought a copy of the NY Times at stopped at Bouchon Bakery for some fresh baked croissants and coffee. Nothing beats sitting outside on a sunny day reading the paper and drinking coffee. We spent the remainder of the morning doing some light art shopping and then finished the day off with a wonderful lunch at Hurleys -- a patio eatery that serves organics. No better end to the visit than a fresh glass of Chardonnay and some crab cakes.

Alas, the trip was all too short. After lunch we headed back to the airport and were homeward bound. But we were certain of one thing -- this is the type of place we will try to get back to.