Malcolm, our driver for the Wine Country tour, was a true gem. A fellow Brit, he added some wry humour to the journey, as well as a good knowledge of wine, which made the whole thing much more enjoyable. It was actually in large measure a marketing excuse to get people to join the wineries' wine clubs. Fair enough, but the actual tours of the wineries were threadbare, although enjoyable. Malcolm actually taught us more than we found out at each winery, and we had enjoyable quips about Graham Norton to boot!
Having said that some of the wine was good, although some of it was like water, but I suppose it's down to individual taste. The countryside was quite gorgeous, and I admit if I'd been living in the U.S., I'd have thought about joining probably one of the three clubs or would at least have bought some wine. But we had a decent amount of time at each place, able to savour our time without being rushed. I'm not listing the wineries themselves, because they change each time I gather. But one of them was Viansa, which had some great oils and mustards!
Tower really are well organised, especially if you book well in advance over the Net. Because there were so few of us and we were ready so quickly, we had the chance to snap some views of the Golden Gate Bridge on the way to the beautiful Muir Woods on the second tour. A great national park, and it was a shame that we were only able to stay there for one hour, but trying to cram Sausalito and Alcatraz in made it necessary, sadly.
Sausalito, I have to say, was a disappointment, again only there for an hour, which made it impossible to get the food we were recommended to get and thought it a good idea to get, given Alcatraz later on. My review of Scoma's shows how well we managed to pull off a 45-minute lunch! Alcatraz was a great time, though, with the weather being completely sunny by then. We'd booked in enough time and brought our e-vouchers with us, but not everyone else did, and they had problems. But the Blue & Gold Fleet was a great 8-or-so-minute transit, and we did the complimentary audio tour of the jail house, as we found the ranger a bit boring. Some of the pictures we took from the island of the bay and the city were remarkable, I have to say. Do it if you're not familiar with any of these places, Muir Woods in particular was a lovely taster and somewhere to return to.