If you have a blog, here’s your chance to shine and enjoy fine wine: I’m offering a prize to each of the six bloggers who post the most well-written reviews of the californiawinehikes.com website. The contest starts tomorrow and will run for six months. The best review will garner its author the grand prize: a case of wine valued at […]

For so many scents, a wheel makes sense
When scribbling tasting notes, wine tasters often find themselves at a loss for words to describe what they’re sensing; one needs a handy tool. Thank goodness for Ann C. Noble.
(tags: wine tasting notes aroma scent flavor taste wheel uc davis winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)

What is That Darn Flavor?
Another take on […]

One of the great beauties of wine - the thing that attracts so many of us to wine - is the almost infinite variety of scents that wine imparts to us. Wine offers a broad range of olfactory experiences across a notable spectrum of grape varieties and, beyond color, it is aroma that often characterizes […]

Napa Valley Merlots to beat out Cabernets?
Soft sensuality vs. structure, depth, and ageability? Could there soon be a new top grape in Napa Valley? Am I making this stuff up?
(tags: napa valley wine merlot cabernet sauvignon harvest tonnage winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)

Center for Ecoliteracy
The Center for Ecoliteracy is dedicated to education for sustainable living.
(tags: ecology energy food […]

The history and impact of Information Technology is a long and interesting one. But now bees are dying, and we might be next. Could we be unwittingly killing ourselves off because of our cellphone use? From Dratz at Confessions of an IT Hitman.
read more | digg story

Cab vs. Merlot, or Cab/Merlot collaboration?
For years, Cabernet Sauvignon has been Napa’s most-planted grape variety. Indeed, these prized vines cover most of Napa County’s 40,000+ vineyard acres, representing 49.3 percent of all 2006 Napa Valley winegrape acreage. However, last year, Cabernet Sauvignon accounted for 56,247 tons of Napa Valley’s winegrape harvest, down a rather significant […]

California Assembly Committee Calls for Phase-Out of Incandescent Lights
A state Assembly committee voted Monday to phase out the incandescent light bulb. As a result, sales of the standard incandescent bulb will be prohibited in California stores starting in 2012.
(tags: incandescent light bulb environment impact landfills lead ban energy conservation)

Let’s Green This City
CFL bulbs use one-third […]

When there’s an elephant in the room, could that room be the Oval Office? And if so, what planet is that elephant on?

Source: Tom Toles, Washington Post.
~winehiker

With Earth Day recently behind us, there’s been quite a lot of media attention devoted lately to replacing our energy-inefficient incandescent light bulbs with the much-more efficient compact fluorescent bulbs.

How many grassroots inquiries and local governments
does it take to recycle a light bulb? 
According to industry stats, more than 90% of the energy produced by incandescent […]

If you have wine, why hike?
To wine or not to whine: The winehiker presents ponderous yet perspicacious platitudes.
(tags: wine hiking philosophy ethics winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)