ROMMEL DRIVES DEEP INTO THE HIGH SIERRAS

Having it in my mind to do a little road trip to Quincy in the new van it seemed only logical to include a few more of those elusive California breweries. 

This, then, goes a long way toward explaining why I was in Lodi, CA at 11 o’clock on a Monday morning… waiting to have a breakfast beer at the Lodi Beer Co.

Located in a grand old building in the midst of a picturesque part of Old Town, it is a well appointed brewpub and restaurant. I was too late (personally) for breakfast and had too many miles to go to justify a nap-inducing, multi-beer lunch so I just ordered a pint of beer and had a nice long chat with the bartender and the only other customer at the bar.

I got into this brewery tour game because I was in a rut, beer-wise, and I needed a good motivation to keep trying something new. I have had a grudge against American made IPA’s for a couple of years now (sorry, but a bushel of hops at the end does not and IPA make…) but of late, in keeping with my original mission, I have sampled them now and again with occasional nice results… like now, for instance.  Throwing caution to the wind I ordered their Triple IPA and was quite content with my choice… good hopping all the way through so there was something to taste besides an excess of shrubbery.  Although the name Lodi brings on facial tics and the odd raised eyebrow in conversation, I would go back to this spot and eat and drink more without a second thought.

Saddling up once more after a thrift store incident next door to the brewery, I hit the dusty trail for the other side of East Jesus in search of Jack Russell Brewing.  Off the beaten path north of the town of Camino (‘tuther side of Placerville…) it took some serious commitment and navigational skills to get there (can’t have the aliens using our road signs to aid in their invasion plans…) but it was well worth it in the end.

Again, it was early on a Monday in the apple country “off season” so I had the bar and server all to myself.  People have so much more time to talk the finer points of beer if they aren’t in the middle of a Friday Happy Hour, don’t you know.  As I said, it is apple country so I felt compelled, again against my standard judgment, to take a shot at their Harvest Apple Ale.  Not some “beer cooler” concoction for beer drinkers who don’t like beer, this one is more like the Asian beers that have a faint back-of-the-throat hint of good apple cider along with the full compliment of regular, yummy beer flavors.

Well, the sun was wending its way toward the yardarm by this point so I fired up my chariot and sent myself scurrying up highway 49 and Gold Country.  There is a vineyard/brewery at Coloma, where Sutter found all that gold, but they are only open Thursday through Sunday.  I drove in anyway and ran into the guy, but no amount of hint nor suggestion could induce him to pour me a taste on a Monday… just somewhere I will need to return to later on in my odyssey.

A few more miles up the road and I was in Auburn where the late hour induced me to get a room at the Motel 6 before heading out for a lovely dinner and a couple of pints at the Auburn Ale House. I started out with their Shanghai Stout with my dinner of flash seared Ahi tuna and deep fried dill pickles and had a pint of Auburn Export Lager for desert.

A good day’s work and now time for a little boob-tube and a well earned rest.