Paso Robles!

Well it’s about time I sit down and tell y’all about our trip (2 months later LOL)!

When my parents said they were going to Paso Robles, I immediately said “I’m in!” I honestly don’t know if they were even inviting me, but I was going. Having only been to Napa for my honeymoon, I was sooo looking forward to going to “the other” California wine country. I am not going to lie, I was kind of afraid that Paso Robles would have that same “snobby” vibe that places in Napa tend to have (don’t hate me for lumping everyone in together), but I am happy to say boy did they prove me wrong. Everybody was so kind and knowledgeably helpful it was AMAZING! Did I mention we brought the dogs? That’s right! It was so easy to find dog friendly places to go… Paso Robles is a place after my own heart!

We started our trip out pretty strongly with Tablas Creek, who turned out to be my absolute favorite place! I was already familiar with them from just word of mouth and instagram, but they really do live up to the hype. If you haven’t heard of them PLEASE do yourself a favor and check them out, you will not regret it. We made our way over to Tin City after that and went to Barrel House Brewing, ONX, Tin City Cider followed by some dessert at Negranti Creamery. I was so stoked to check out Tin City after watching the documentary on Prime Video and I loved it! I really wish we had something like it here in San Diego. The next day we made our way out to the big boys, Justin and Daou! I was so pleasantly surprised by Justin, I expected it to be so corporate, but it really was a nice experience and beautiful vineyard. Daou is really one of those places that you just have to go see. You honestly can’t beat the view up on “Daou Mountain,” pair it with some of their amazing wine and DAMN! My love of Pinot Noir helped me sniff out the lovely family owned, Windward. Because they only do Pinot Noir, their tastings are actually a vertical tasting of 5 different vintages. This was super cool and I loved it! For dinner that night we headed over to Firestone Walker and had some good food and even better beer. My husband actually ran into one of the 805 brewers on a walk with Remy (our dog) and did y’all know that they have to brew 805 WEEKLY?! Isn’t that insane? As you can tell, that was our longest day of exploring and tasting, so the next day was a little more chill. We started with a trip out to Tobin James, of course, we had some of their famous zinfandel, but they really had wines that I thought were SO much better. After that we visited Barr Estate Winery, which was a big highlight for me. Their wine was GREAT and guess what….. they are San Diego transplants! What are the odds? We ended our last day with a trip to downtown Paso Robles and dinner at Pappy McGregor’s. When I make it back to Paso I will DEFINITELY go back there! The next morning we had to make room for our cases upon cases of wine and beer in the van, then headed off to our last stop: La Vigne. We really did go for the pizza, but the wine spoke for itself. They actually offered a cheese pairing as well.

Let me tell you guys, I cannot wait until my next Paso Robles trip, and YES I will be bringing my dog with me :) Cheers!