John Condon
California Rivers Tours
January 12, 2008 | by brett | Permalink
It’s safe to say that John Condon knows Northern California’s Wine Country. A former deputy sheriff of Sonoma County turned Russian River kayak tour guide, John now loads passengers into his twelve seat van and carts them to the wineries that have made Sonoma and Napa counties a worldwide destination.
John’s California Rivers Tours picked us up for a little holiday wine tasting over the break, where our party of five set out to revisit our favorite locations while uncovering new ones. This was the first wine tour for three of us, so John took the reins and we were off for six hours of wine, sightseeing, and fun.
There were three things that I really enjoyed about the tour John took us on.
1) The word “complimentary.” In the past three or four wine tasting outings I’ve made with a guideless group of friends, I ended up forking over $5-$10 a winery for tasting fees. During our day we went to five wineries (Armida, Hop Kiln, Korbel, Harvest Moon, and Hook n’ Ladder) and not one winery made us dip into the wallet for tasting. So instead of dropping twenty-five dollars on fees, I was able to grab a great bottle of Zinfandel from Harvest Moon.
2) John’s lunch. When we were done with the champagne tasting at Korbel we joined John on a private patio, where a table full of goodies awaited us. The salmon we ate was caught by his son and smoked by John. The jam was from the berries he and his granddaughter hand picked. This, paired with a bottle of wine purchased earlier, was perfect. The meal broke up the day and allowed us some time to catch up. It is what John calls, “his differentiating factor that seperates his tour from all the others offered in wine country.”
3) John’s tidbits. As we cruised around a corner John told us to look under the bridge for people for steelhead. When we approached Hop Kiln, John had us smell a hop plant which he then identified as being part of the cannabis family. All the little things that you would never take notice of doing your own wine tour enhanced the experience that much more.
John’s website is www.calrivers.com. He is the owner and operator, and can be reached either by phone at (707) 579-2209 or by email at calrivers1(at)aol.com. He is one of the most reasonably priced (per group, groups 1-7, $50/hr, groups 8-12, $75/hr, lunch included) and experienced tour guides around, and I encourage you to give him a call if you’re thinking about seeing Wine Country.
The smoked salmon alone is worth it.
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