Sonoma City Hall

We decided we all needed a change of scene today, so we took Spike to the Sonoma Valley Regional Park. It's a lovely drive through the Sonoma Valley to get there and the vines, especially the older, head pruned ones, are on the cusp of changing color All of the fruit has been harvested except maybe a few zins which will be kept on the vine until they turn to raisins when their sugar content will be very high and and they will be turned into dessert vines. The Italians call them vin santo, and in Germany they are known a eiswein.  They are quite expensive because by the time the fruit has turned to raisins, they have very little juice. 

I don't know what the process looks like, and not every winery makes these wines. They usually come in nice looking bottles and we have had a few of them in our cabinet for years because we don't really like them, but I'm a sucker for a pretty bottle!

There were a lot of dogs out for a Sunday walk and Spike enjoyed meeting them. We know him well enough to know now that he would hate the dog park next to the parking lot. He would be overwhelmed by too many dogs at once and doesn't really know how to play so wouldn't know what to do. Ozzie never wanted anything to do with a dog park either. We took him once and he just went and sat by the exit gate until we took him away. 

I can't say I really like dog parks either. They are usually dreary looking dirt lots with a few plastic chairs scattered around. But I know that many dog park people form lasting friendships. But they also tend to get bowled over by packs of playing dogs, something that happened to a Berkeley friend who wound up with a broken femur.

It was interesting to watch Spike find his way down a narrow rocky trail with hairpin turns and high steps. He navigated mainly by keeping his nose against one of our legs. John commented that he was more cautious than he remembered on this trail and I said I thought he still had some vision in one eye the last time we went there. It's remarkable how well he does on terrain like this and it doesn't seem to put him off his walks.

On the lower, wide flat trail we met some nice people, including a couple with a blind dog, and a family with a Springer spaniel and a little girl who  kept asking, "is that a springer spaniel?" and not waiting for our answer before asking again. When her parents finally confirmed that it was,  it seemed that she must not ever have seen another springer. Theirs was very nicely groomed, unlike Spike's rather ragamuffin style

Since we were halfway there we drove on into the town of Sonoma ,  a pretty old town with quite a history  dating back to the when California was briefly part of Mexico.The tourists seem to have gone south now, but it was a lovely day and we wandered around the square with its 
old city hall. The pole in front is not a telephone pole but a palm tree whose little top fronds are several dozen feet further up.

It's been a nice day but with gusty winds that tend to put everyone slightly on edge. It blew our umbrella out of its stand again so it is now closed and tied to the porch railing and we're off to Dana and Jim's for Sunday Supper....