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Award-winning Rum at Desert Diamond Distillery in Kingman

Photo of barrels with title text overlay: Award-winning Rum Desert Diamond Distillery Kingman, AZ

When I finally made it out of California and reached Arizona on my RV trip from California to Texas, I was really looking forward to tasting my first Arizona wine. My original plan was to boondock at Stetson Winery but a delay earlier in the trip meant I arrived on a Monday when the winery was closed. Kingman has a couple of interesting Harvest Hosts boondocking spots and this presented me with the pleasant option of staying at one of the other locations, Desert Diamond Distillery, and learning about rum instead. Desert Diamond Distillery – Rum & Vodka Owners John and Debbie Patt are wonderful hosts and obviously love what they do. John was busy with a tour when I arrived so Debbie gave me…

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Bucket List Things to do in Texas by Region

Texas is a diverse state with a mind-boggling number of things to do. Bucket list worthy things to do in Texas by region recommended by travel bloggers. #travel #texas #food #wine #hiking

When I moved to Texas a few months ago and started researching where to go and things to do, I was almost overwhelmed. I knew Texas was a BIG state but I didn’t quite realize how much there is to do here and how diverse the state is. My new home base is near the very southern tip of Texas in the Rio Grande Valley (in the South Texas Plains region) where nature and birding are king. I have started exploring this area and plan to slowly work my way north (and the little bit that there is farther south), exploring all the wonders of this amazing state. To help me in my exploration, I asked some fellow bloggers to give me recommendations of their…

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Most Viewed Posts 2018 Edition

This is one of my favorite posts to do during the year. It is so fun to look back over articles and see what was popular and resonated with my readers.

This is one of my favorite posts to do each year. It is so fun for me to look back over my articles and see what was popular and resonated with my readers during the year. It gives me food for thought about what to include as future posts. 2018 was a year of huge changes for me. The first few months of the year, things went on pretty much as usual. I visited lots of places in Gold Country to find the gems to share with you on the blog. Then, somewhere around May, some events got put into motion and I decided to start a whole new chapter in my life. I wrote all about it in post #7 below. Top Ten…

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Boondocking at Walker Honey Farm and Dancing Bee Winery

Walker Honey Farm and Dancing Bee Winery in Rogers, TX, may be a little off the beaten path but well worth a visit for amazing raw honey and honey wine.

I joined Harvest Hosts RV membership program to find some unique and interesting places to stay on my RV trip from northern California to southern Texas. I picked at least one intriguing place in each state and built my RV park stays around them. When I found Walker Honey Farm in Texas, I knew I needed to add it to my stops. Why Walker Honey Farm? First, they were the only honey farm I came across, but more importantly, they make mead. My former significant other and I made mead for several years and I still remember how much I enjoyed it. Part of the attraction of mead, I think, is that it is pretty hard to find*. There used to be a winery in…

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Casa Rondeña Winery – I Finally Get Some New Mexico Wine

Casa Rondeña Winery has been chosen “Best Winery” seven years in a row by Albuquerque the Magazine readers.Read on to learn why.

Although I had cases of amazing Gold Country wine in my wine fridge when I was getting ready to leave northern California, I didn’t bring much with me. I shipped a couple of cases and gave the rest away. Turns out, that was a bit of a mistake. My plan was to stop at wineries along the way and buy wine to drink as I traveled. That worked for the first week or two when I stopped in Lodi and Paso Robles. After that, discovering new wineries and wine remained an elusive longing. Once I left Paso Robles, wineries were either not located near my route or closed. Such was the case with a winery in Arizona. I had planned to boondock at Stetson Winery…

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Notes from an RV Newbie’s First Weekend on the Road

If my first weekend on the road as an RV newbie is any indication of how things are going to go for the next few weeks, I’m truly going to love this life.

If you have been following my blog, you know that just before my birthday I made a life changing decision to downsize, buy a travel trailer and do some long-term traveling while moving in the general direction of southern Texas. Preparing to be an RV newbie has been a monumental chore with not much to write about so it has been a while since I posted. I’m back now and plan to share the whole adventure with you. If my first weekend on the road as an RV newbie is any indication of how things are going to go for the next few weeks, I’m truly going to love this life. Day one, Friday, October 12 I finally pulled out from Pine Grove at about…

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Why I Missed the 2nd Anniversary of the Blog

March 7th was the 2nd anniversary of the Gold Country Cowgirl blog. I had intended to do a special post and a giveaway for the blog anniversary but between a three-day trip to Southern California, having company, lots of wine events, being sick twice and an especially busy couple of weeks of pet sitting, that special day came and went with hardly a thought. In fact, I haven’t written a blog post since the end of February. When I sat down and made a list of all the things I’d done over the past four to five weeks (and that list didn’t include several personal events), I wasn’t surprised that I haven’t gotten much written and that I’m sick! The good thing is that several of the…

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ZinEX Zinfandel Experience — Zin Lover’s Paradise

The Grand Tasting is one of the five events comprising the annual Zinfandel Experience, also known as ZinEX. The event is designed to entertain, enlighten and delight. Check out my post to see if they lived up to those goals.

When I attended the Wine Bloggers Conference in Santa Rosa in November, I signed up for an education session entitled Zinfandel Old and New which was put on by Zinfandel Advocates and Producers (ZAP). That’s where I learned about ZinEX, their three-day Zinfandel Experience extravaganza devoted entirely to Zinfandel. I have definitely become a Zin girl since moving to Amador County because of the history as well as the wine. I really wanted to attend the event but tickets were a little pricey for this gal on a budget and it was in San Francisco. That’s a three hour drive and I had no desire to drive there and try to navigate the city on my own. I doubted that I could get…

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Oldest Documented Old Vine Zinfandel Vineyard in the Americas

I've been researching Zinfandel for some time now, learning what is so special about old vine Zinfandel. When I saw an opportunity to visit the oldest documented Zinfandel vineyard in the Americas, planted in the 1860s, I knew I had to go.

You may have read elsewhere on the blog that I’ve been working on a post about old vine Zinfandel for some time. When I saw an opportunity to visit the oldest documented Zinfandel vineyard in the Americas, planted in the 1860s, I knew I had to go. The 3-day OGP Zinfandel Weekend event included an optional tour of the Original Grandpère Vineyard on Saturday and Sunday. I joined the tour on Saturday which was led by Rusty Folena, winemaker at Vino Noceto. OGP Zinfandel Weekend, Shenandoah Valley, Plymouth, CA Only four wineries are privileged to produce wine from grapes grown in the Original Grandpère Vineyard (OGP), also called Vineyard 1869. The OGP Weekend is put on by the three wineries located in the…

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Most Viewed Posts of 2017

Last year, when I wrote a post about my most viewed posts of 2016, the blog had only been in operation for just under 10 months. During that time, I wrote 34 posts, an average of over three a month. I didn’t meet my goal of at least four posts per month but I was pleased with the quality of what I had put out. When I sat down to figure out my most viewed posts of 2017, I was a little shocked to see that during 2017 I only published 32 posts for the whole year. That’s way below my goal of four per month. Consistency is definitely my biggest short coming when it comes to blogging, but I believe in quality over quantity. I…

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