Yes, Virginia, New York, Florida, et.al. there is life in Napa Valley without wineries, but I gotta admit it's a bit hard to find.

We got to the valley about 12:30 and located our motel and the balloon location. Then it was time to locate lunch. We drove north to Yountville. I remembered a time I came here with two old ladies from church to visit a third at the Veteran's Home. Afterwards, we had eaten in a reconstructed building. In the event, though, Rich and I discovered The Diner, in the first bus station in town (from the 40s.) The food was good (I had huevos rancheros, and Rich a chef's salad) and we enjoyed looking at the crewel and needlepoint artwork on the walls. It looks like Guatemalan molas. After lunch we got some information in the chamber of commerce, and there's a historical walking tour that might be good some time when the temperature isn't teasing 100.

On north we went. In Rutherford I spied a cop. My Brit friend would go nuts (we saw another in Napa, Ann!) When she visited she was determined to get a picture of an American policeman, and in Rutherford I stopped TWO and she got her picture with them both. Later that same visit she also found one in Chinatown. By the time I'd told Rich about Ann and cops, we were almost to our goal in Calistoga.

Many years ago we went to this area with the kids. Rich was spending his weeks in Sacramento and only getting home to Novato on weekends, and we took a couple of short vacations together in the area. We went to the Petrified Forest and took a train ride to the top of a little hill. Monica climbed inside a petrified tree, I think. This one is a private enterprise and better than the National Monument, which has been raped by souvenir hunters. Anyway, we decided,then, not to go to Old Faithful Geyser because of the expense. I still wanted to see it.

This area was and is volcanic, though the volcanoes themselves are long dead. This is, of course, why the grapes grow so well and the wine is so good. There's still steam and hot rocks underneath, though. This is one of three geysers of the "faithful" type. (the others are in Yellowstone and New Zealand.) Currently it goes off every 10 minutes, so we got to see the tail end of one eruption and three more. One was kind of wimpy, but the others were magnificent. One couple was standing in the spray but decided to move! However, by the time the water hits the pool it's cooled enough for mosquito fish to live in the pool. There was a story of the first owner of the place putting tropical fish in the pool and we were hoping to see some, but they've apparently died off.

There's a neat sign that says "You are standing in the core of a volcano." The place makes a try at being educational. There are other hot springs and such in the area, and we want to tour the CalPine generating plant. I've noticed, lately, the more we see, the more there is to see. Anyway, they also have "fainting goats." These guys have a double recessive gene that means they faint if they're scared. (Gee, why would that be a RECESSIVE gene??) Both Rich and I had the same thought and said "boo!" to the goats, but we didn't scare them.

From there we went to Bale Grist Mill State Park. They no longer have a millpond so the water is pumped up to the flume. I suspect it's recycled from the millrace, like a fountain. There's a nice museum on the side with all sorts of information on the mill, and then the mill itself. The man running the place came and talked to us, describing how the mill works. The miller would use a rule of thumb to determine how fine the grain was being ground, and he also would put his nose to the grindstone because if the stones touched each other, the flour smelled bad and was ruined. The ordinary grind was the run of the mill and then if it was sifted or reground it was different. He told us another which I've forgotten.

They actually grind wheat on weekends here. The corn stones aren't working so they have them open to demonstrate the grooves and all. They get ground corn from somewhere else. I bought some stoneground wheat flour, though, because I have a great bread recipe... somewhere... and when it cools off I'll make it. Meanwhile, the flour goes into the freezer to keep it save from meal moths. I realized after we'd left that I should have bought some for the neighbor, who is always making bread. Selfish!

We saw bats in the mill, too!

Then we went to the Mumm Winery to look at Ansel Adams pictures. They're gorgeous. It's a bit disappointing, though, that no longer is there a free winetasting anywhere. It used to be you could go from winery to winery and get free samples. I guess there were too many people like us, who then didn't buy.

Back to Napa itself and we checked into the motel. I asked what was to do that wasn't wineries and the girl had no idea. We tried to find the tourist center, but it was closed by the time we got there. However, we walked around the downtown with its 2500 historic houses. There's a statue to a gramophone speaker and the start of Motorola. We ate at a new restaurant, Bombay Bistro, which I can heartily recommend.

Back to the motel where I lasted 5 minutes in the pool, brrrrr, before coming in to watch "Weakest Link" with the Survivors. (Badly done.)