OK, So I admit it. Against all my tourist instincts, Napa Valley is a beautiful place. Even though it is an engineered environment. All the little vineyards and chateau along the avenued roads, often with each row of vines having a rose bush at the end of it. The backdrop of the oh so green hills/mountains. Driving through the small towns with their quaint 19th Century Main Street - places like Calistoga, St Helena, Oakville and Younstown. This all makes for a very relaxed and pretty place. The road is a bit on the busy side, being more or less a single road which runs the whole length of the valley. Even without stopping at the vineyards (They charge for wine tasting, which I think is a bit mean).
Yesterday we left our shady campground and ventured out into what promised to be a hot day here (and it was). Our goal for today was to see Sonoma, a town which is not actually in Napa Valley, but a couple of valleys to the West. We were going to drive down the valley to Oakville and take the Oakville Grade Road over the hills. Before we could do that we had to drive past the Bale Grist Mill, which only opens on weekends........ however, as we drove past Sally noticed that the big waterwheel was turning, so we went in to have a look. Sure enough the mill was open and working, so we went further. A school party had booked a tour and they let us tag along, so we were treated to a tour and demonstration of this flour mill built in 1846.
After visiting the mill we continued through St Helena and took the road west from Oakville. We did not realize how narrow steep and winding the road was, good job we didn't have the trailer on. The views of the valleys now reverted to more natural woodland, with a few vineyards tucked in to the few flat spots along the road. Crossing over the hills we ended up in Glen Ellen, a another pretty little town just by the Jack London Historic State Park, which looked interesting, but was not open (Jack London, famous author over here, wrote Call Of The Wild). This then led us down to Sonoma, wher we parked in the very large town square for a wander. We stopped in at the Tourist Information Center and spoke with a dear lady who was most enthusiastic in here invitation to do things in the area. We told here we were just passing through and had a couple of hours and she suggested that we go, no actually she told us we had to, to a local vineyard (even though we told her we don't drink much), a museum about 20 minutes out of town as well as a walk round the sqaure, which Thrift (Charity) shop, which cafe to have a cuppa in, which restaurant to eat a meal in and information about the Mission (which is what we had come to see) and the Barracks and other stuff. She ended up by telling us about how to rent a house, as many people now come here for a month at a time, because it is so pleasant. This lady (though very nice) was in the wrong business, she should be selling Time Shares (perhaps she does).
Sonoma Town Square is large,about 200 yards on each side, with a park in the middle. It is the site of the last, and most northerly, of the 21 Missions built in California. Started in 1823 it was the only Mission to be started by the Mexicans, it became properly established by 1830, but was sold off in 1834 by the Mexican Govt. Then taken over in 1836 by the Mexican army as the famous (?) Mexican General Vallejo made it his Northern Border Garrison, to defend Mexico from the Russians, would you believe, who had developed a number of fur trade communities to Northern California (Fort Ross up through Oregon).
This was a very confused time in Californian history, though it was part of Mexico the population was very small, several thousand, and it was long way away from the Mexican President (who between 1821 and 1846 changed 40 times). By 1846 the garrison was down to about 30 men when on June 14th 1846 the 'Black Bear Incident' took place, the town was taken over by the Black Bear Party - group of American settler who raised a flag in the square, with a black bear on it, captured General Vallejo and declared establishment of the free and independent Republic of California. This was part of a bloodless rebellion that led to California becoming independent in 1847, a move which was strengthened by the discovery of gold in 1848 and a consequential increase in population to more than 100,000. It then became a part of the USA, being declared 31st State in 1850.
The mission itself was the simplest of any of the Mission buildings we had seen and as a building quite unremarkable.
We continued our walk around the square, stopping at the Sunflower Cafe for a drink in their shady back garden, did some window shopping and returned to the van. We decided that this was a very nice place to spend an afternoon.
We now drove on to Napa, to eat. We had a 20% coupon for Denny's, so that was the place we ate. From there we stopped at the Walmart and then back to the trailer. Tired, but a very enjoyable day.
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