As our PTWG spring break tour winds its way north out of Healdsburg, up Dry Creek Valley Road, past mom-and-pop "we're blending juice in our barn" set-ups,  all of a sudden,  boom!  Statement winery on the left! The Ferrari Carano estate, Villa Fiore, is a little bit of Italy plopped down in Northern Sonoma County.  No, make that a BIG bit of Italy.  A 25-thousand square foot Tuscan-style villa surrounded by five acres of meticulously-landscaped grounds and gardens.  Not a blade of grass out of place.  They say they...

So many wineries, so little time.   That's the dilemma as we storm through Sonoma County on our northern California spring break tour.  Speaking of storms, just as we settled in at our next stop, the rains began, intensified and refused to let up.  We left Portland for this? No, we left Portland for this: Sonoma Cutrer. When we mapped out wineries for this tour, we had two requirements:  The wineries had to produce wine that you can find on retail shelves in Portland.  And the wine had to be...

In some ways, it's the typical American winemaker success story.  The family started making their own wine in the basement.  The second son continued the tradition.  He eventually built a nice business out of the family hobby. Happens all the time.  But this particular story took a detour when the second son temporarily focused on another passion and did pretty well with it.  He won six Academy Awards. Francis Ford Coppola is a film-making legend.  Now semi-retired, Coppola has two wineries, one in Napa and another, which we visited,...