Wine Country: Eating and Drinking Your Way from SFO to Healdsburg

I feel like I left my a piece of my heart in wine country last week. People keep asking me, "How was your vacation?" And, what my internal monologue says is "I want to put Ike in the convertible MINI and move out there."

Instead, I'll share my favorite spots with you and immediately begin planning my next visit there to explore more.  First up, Tim Zahner of Inside Sonoma mapped a great drive for me from SFO to Healdsburg. I couldn't fit all of his recommendations in, but everything I did was great, so I'm sharing the full itinerary with you here.

Stop 1: Vista Point at the Golden Gate Bridge

I've seen the Golden Gate Bridge from the city and I've driven over it in a taxi from the airport, but somehow I'd missed that you can get out and take in the full view at Vista Point. It's an amazing panoramic view from the Sausalito side that spans Alcatraz, the city and the bridge. Definitely a spot for a photo op, which of course, I did: 

Me at Vista Point

Stop 2: Della Fattoria in Petaluma

Petaluma is a great first stop for lunch. A) It's adorable and feels like you're starting to be in wine country rather than San Francisco and B) It's home to Della Fattoria. 

Upon Foursquare check-in, I realized I was in a bakery mecca. But I was craving a salad. Compromise? A panzanella salad featuring local asparagus that rocked my world:

Panzanella Salad at Della Fattoria in Petaluma

The sandwiches and baked goods looked fantastic as well, but I took a quick walk around downtown because next on my list was... 

Stop 3: Screamin' Mimis in Sebastopol

Tim told me I had to get the affogato (espresso plus ice cream) at Screamin' Mimis and I convinced myself that I needed the caffeine to adjust to the Pacific time zone. What I didn't count on was that they would also have local strawberry ice cream.  Clearly, I had to get both. Don't judge.

Affogato and Local Strawberry Ice Cream from Screamin' Mimis

After that, Tim recommended wine. Now, I had to get to work (the impetus for the whole trip was that I was working the weekend) so I had to peel off at this point and meet colleagues. But I'll share the rest of his recommendations below in case you can do the full road trip.

Stop 4: The Barlow in Sebastopol

I did drive around The Barlow, which is this cool new compound of food and wine shops. There was a coffee shop, a wine shop and more coming. Definitely something to include if you're near Sebastopol!

Stop 5: Balletto Vineyards in Sonoma 

When visiting Balletto, Tim recommends the pinot noir rose and finding the field of dreams... I'm intrigued and will be back.

Stop 6: DeLoach Vineyards in Santa Rosa

Tim recommends trying the pinots and chardonnays at this Russian River Valley vineyard and tasting room.

Steps 7 and 8: Rodney Strong and J Winery near Healdsburg

I heard great things about these two, especially the bubbly tasting at J. Another must do if you're nearby.

Stop 9: Bear Republic Brewpub in Healdsburg

After three wine tastings, you'll need some grub. Bear River came highly recommended from the locals - also, doing a beer tasting in the Healdsburg area is another day idea - there were several breweries that sound great.

If you want to see all of the recommendations from my northern California wine country Google map, click here. Did I miss any of your favorites? Tell me in the comments below or tweet me @tammy.

Important Takeaways from Mary Meeker's 2013 Internet Trends Report

KPCB Internet Trends 2013 from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

Everyone who works in digital, social, mobile... heck, anyone who works in media and communications, should be reading Mary Meeker's annual Internet Trends report. A slow day at the office allowed me to catch up. Instead of just saving them on Evernote, I figured I'd share the most important takeaways from my perspective. Call it the Cliff Notes for Social Media Strategists version:

• There are 2.4 billion global Internet users - check out the year over year growth numbers coming out of Iran!
• Advertisers should be paying a lot more attention to mobile campaigns and media companies should be innovating how ads engage mobile users. So much untapped opportunity.
• More than 500 million photos are uploaded and shared annually via Facebook, Instagram, Flickr and (growing!!!) Snapchat. Graphics remain extremely important to making your message more sharable across the digital universe. [HINT: That's why AARP just launched our first Instagram contest: InstaGrands!]
• 100 hours of content in uploaded to YouTube every single minute. Invest in upping your vid skills! Speaking of, Snapchat and Vine are currently doubling their uploads every two months. (So are fitness apps and devices! Maybe it's time to order that FitBit...)
• Is your brand leveraging the most popular social networks with a unique strategic focus? (Mine is for all but MySpace. I love Justin Timberlake, but do we really have to go back there?)
• Tablets are growing three times faster than iPhones. How's your website look there? Are all of your calls to action built for responsive design?
• The typical mobile phone user reaches for their device 150 times a day. I wonder if I hit that threshold before lunch.

Mary's report always gives me a slew of "to dos" and "to learns"... here are the ones that jumped out at me this year:

• I need to check out DropCam. Sounds similar to Skype and Google Hangout to me, so why is it's use surging when it has a cost?
• Think through how we use sound for business as voice comes back to phone via SoundCloud and WeChat.
• If behavior is the cause of 40% of deaths, how can tools like Jawbone and FitBit incentivize/gamify healthier behavior and save our country money in health care down the road? (And, maybe I should put down this hush puppy.)
• Will wearable devices like Google Glass outpace even tablets in adaptation?
• Can I make a business case for drones? Or is that just a fun thing to consider using at the office?
• It's really interesting to follow the digital trends in China. What's trending there that will be big in the United States two years from now?
• There will be 2.4 jobs in computer science for every person that graduates with a computer science degree. How can we get more American students to focus on STEM, especially girls? I love what CodeAcademy and Black Girls Code are doing... how can I help amplify or support in my community?
• Good brainstorm idea: How could we re-imagine how we do business? If we hack our own business and get more innovative, we're less at risk of others doing it for us.

Dig into it and share your takeaways!