Imagine if you can (or wish to), living in a wine barrel. Literally…

SOME NECESSARY BACKSTORY (as is my usual wont…)

Wine has always (up until very recently) figured significantly in my life. Back in my callow youth…in contrast to my callow adulthood…I regularly enjoyed a glass of something red, robust, and redolent with character. I wish I could say that that favored vintage, back then, was on the order of a hard-to-source Swiss Vole (Rhône) but more often it took the form of Mountain Red (the favored red jug-wine of the East San Fracisco Bay Area’s academic community and produced by California vintner Carlo Rossi, of GALLO VINEYARDS fame). It came in gallon jugs with a finger-ring on its neck that made it convenient for slugging down draughts by groups, when passed around, but the quality was still surprisingly good (Rossi’s ‘Gallo Wines’ quality).

Us early 70s-era undergrads at Berkeley, all of whom lived in modestly priced Berkeley brown-shingles, would take a ‘tribe-trip’ over to Marin, just across the Bay via the San Rafael Bridge, and always lug a jug or two of that vigorously lusty red brew with us.

One time in particular we made this trek late at night, near midnight; my confreres and I all agreed to rendezvous on Marin’s 3000+ foot Mt. Tamalpais summit. The road from Mill Valley leading up to it is Panoramic Avenue and slightly after midnight; parking our various vehicles in the summit parking lot, we dutifully trudged up the Mt. Tam’s slope till there was no more ‘up’ to climb, and looked around for the others.

It was a clear, near-moonless night and few among us had thought to bring flashlights, so my buddy had a great idea. We had all seen Arthur C. Clarke’s blockbuster SciFi film ‘2001: A Space Odessey’ a short while earlier and he was flashing on its opening scene, wherein a group of simians (Chimpanzees) meet another band of monkeys and challenge each other. Amidst all the howling and posturing (in the film at this point), one Chimp picks up a femur bone and after brandishing it like a weapon, flings it high into the sky, whereupon it turns into a PanAm Moonliner ferrying passengers through space.

Then suddenly, after slugging down a few belts of our Mountain Red, he starts screeching and howling just like the movie’s monkeys. This brought several responding screeches from various parts of the summit and shortly we were joined by other howling, yelping primates (that we vaguely recognised as fellow undergrads). Strangely, however, there were also seven or so others who were strangers (members of another monkey tribe?) to us; but that didn’t prevent everyone from sitting down and sharing the jug-wine.

To our great fortune, the strangers had brought a lid of, as Tricky Dicky (Nixon) so colorfully misstated it, Mara-Ju-wanna, and not long after that, post Mountain Red draughts and augmented by tokes on the several lit doobies that had appeared in the darkness, we were all well on our way to a celestial kosmik merging with the vastness of the billions upon billions of stars above us in the night sky.

Not far off to the south, the lights of San Francisco blazed forth, partly blanketed by a thick layer of Potato Patch fog (formed over the famed Potato Patch Shoals that lie a bit seaward from the Golden Gate Bridge) and off to the east, the lights of Alma Mater UC Berkeley were as clear as the proverbial bell. With the Golden Gate Bridge traffic noise nearly smothered by the encroaching fog, other than that, all was perfectly silent…except for the strange dissonant chatter and screeching of a bunch of temporary, proto-apes, clustered together on a hill-top.

After getting progressively more stoned by the hour, at some early-wee-hours-of-the-early-AM moment, a still lucid soul among us suggested that we probably ought to go to someone’s pad to mellow out and recover from all the Cannabis decompensation that had been going on. Already one or two of our group appeared to have decided to venture out towards the starry fields in the skies by the quickest means and that route led directly to a rocky precipice where local rock climbers practice their holds during the day…yep, definitely time to lasso the stragglers and head back down the hill.

Fortunately, one of the strangers volunteered his digs near Coit Tower on Signal Hill (AKA: Telegraph Hill) in The City, so all we had to do is all navigate by whatever means we had to reach it, where we could safely bed down for the night.

One of the newly-met strangers (with his yummy) girlfriend had apparently driven up to the summit parking lot on a beautiful BMW R-69 motorcycle but he gave signs of being totally unable to operate it safely when the plan to go back down materialized: so the question went around, “Who wants to drive the GF back down and over to The City on the bike?”

As luck would have it, I was the only motorcycle driver in our group (even if it was ‘only’ a Honda CB-350…a much smaller and less powerful mount than the big Bimmer). I had never before driven anything larger than my faithful old Honda but had lusted after Bimmers like this for most of my youthful days (the R-series BMW bikes were THE status symbol for all wannabe Berkeley Bohemians, you see)...but that didn’t necessarily qualify me as being able to actually ride one. That merely made me the only qualified, potential two-wheeled chauffeur among us, although the thought of risking the GF’s life on a motorized two-wheeler terrified the natural-born safety wonk in me something fierce (despite being slightly stoned).

Still, as a naturally cautious person, I had remained less-wasted and wined-out than everyone else, so I was again the only logical choice for this assignment. OOGH! Willing or not…

As for the girlfriend, she was also quite stoned by this time, although as far as female peers went, she was unquestionably a foxy young Asian thing (the Bimmer owner had impeccable taste in wimmin as well as in bikes) and so after a few moments of hurried, blurry BMW motorcycle orientation, the tasty GF hopped on and off we went, back down Panoramic Avenue to Mill Valley and thence to what famed American Airlines ‘Music Till Dawn’ host Ken Ackerman called the City by the Bay’ (‘Flagship Liner, City of San Francisco’, which was an actual AA DC-7C airliner, so named) on his late-night light classics radio show (midnight to dawn, nightly).

Today, speaking of that program, I cannot listen to the theme music of that memorable program without instantly falling under a sort of dreamy spell of extreme nostalgia, since Ackerman’s theme music (variations on Sy Mann’s famously evocative instrumental number, ‘That’s All’) epitomizes for me all that was so wonderfully magic about the formerly great City of San Francisco (before it all went to hell under current Mayor London Breed’s tenure and her radical Democrat cohorts).

Once we made it down the mountain and reached Highway 1, we started across the bridge. It was a typically chill summer night with fog starting to creep in and neither of us had a jacket on. Fortunately, the wine helped warm us up a bit and the bike also had a wind-fairing on it that also provided some protection, so we crossed the Golden Gate’s span and arrived at the toll booth. I distinctly remember as we reached the bridge’s mid-span, the famed Diaphone fog horns on the bridge bellowed forth loudly above the din of the bike’s noise, to announce the encroaching fog.

As I pulled up in front of the toll booth, hoping like mad that the toll-taker wouldn’t notice how stoned both of us were, it suddenly dawned on me that neither of us had any change on us. The bridge-fare was, if memory serves me right, about $1.25, but it could have been ten-cents and we would have been equally out of luck! What to do? Finally, after several seconds of reflection that felt more like half an hour, I decided to simply fess-up and level with the toll guy, admitting that we were ‘slightly’ stoned and also penniless. He looked decent enough, sort of youngish and hip, and perhaps taking tolls paid him enough to live in the city, so what the hell? It was worth a bank-shot!

To his eternal credit (and my great relief), he listened patiently for a few quiet seconds, then broke into a huge smile and said “No sweat, amigos! Go on ahead anyway!” I could have pissed my pants with relief!

So, thanking whatever gods were on duty in Heaven that night, I put the Bimmer in gear and we were off and on our way to Coit(us) Tower. Since it was tall and stood out fairly well, it was a convenient navigational marker (IP) to steer for (thank GOD!) once we got off the bridge; when we were within a block or two away from Coit Tower, I yelled back at the pretty GF, “Hey, what’s the address?”

For reasons I’ll never fathom, she decided to play some sort of game and wouldn’t tell me, encouraging me instead to ‘...just guess!” ARRRRGH! Oh yeah, we had almost make it home safely and without complications, despite our stoner-buzz, and she suddenly decides to get all cutesy on me at the very last second!

After stopping and pleading w/her (simultaneously admiring her fabulous rack) didn’t work, I finally bluntly told her “Look, if you won’t tell me, I’m going to drive you down to Hunter’s Point and let you off there…” Hunter’s Point, not far from there, at that time was a real low-life bowery, surrounded as it was by shipyards, rundown-dwellings and scum-bag, gang-banger hangouts by the score, on its streets. That must have scared the wits back into her, because she quickly coughed up an address and we FINALLY arrived at just after 2AM to find everyone else in our Berkeley group gathered together and wondering just where in the hell I was!

[For the record, I was never able to afford the Bimmer of my dreams and have remained on Hondas (if progressively larger displacements) all of my life (there’s a 1999 Honda VFR800Fi in the garage as I speak).]

FAST FORWARD TO THE PRESENT

So, hopefully the above anecdote from my early 70s period sheds a little meaningful context on my life-long affection for red wine (especially medium bodied Rhône varietals) but let me return to my opening statement: Can you imagine LIVING in a wine barrel? Until I myself did just that (albeit briefly), I couldn’t even conceive of such a possibility.

There is, you see, on the Mendocino County coast of Northern California, a tiny community known as Albion. The below selection cites the pertinent demographics that apply to Albion’s population of about 153 people (as of 2020), taken from the WIKIPEDIA on-line reference:

“The 2010 United States Census reported that Albion had a population of 168. The population density was 90.7 inhabitants per square mile (35.0/km2). The racial makeup of Albion was 150 (89.3%) White, 1 (0.6%) African American, 4 (2.4%) Native American, 5 (3.0%) Asian, 0 (0.0%) Pacific Islander, 0 (0.0%) from other races, and 8 (4.8%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 4 persons (2.4%). “The Census reported that 156 people (92.9% of the population) lived in households, 12 (7.1%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 0 (0%) were institutionalized. “There were 82 households, out of which 13 (15.9%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 20 (24.4%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 8 (9.8%) had a female householder with no husband present, 5 (6.1%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 8 (9.8%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 1 (1.2%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 36 households (43.9%) were made up of individuals, and 15 (18.3%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 1.90. There were 33 families (40.2% of all households); the average family size was 2.55. “The population was spread out, with 20 people (11.9%) under the age of 18, 10 people (6.0%) aged 18 to 24, 40 people (23.8%) aged 25 to 44, 64 people (38.1%) aged 45 to 64, and 34 people (20.2%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 50.3 years. For every 100 females, there were 115.4 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 108.5 males. “There were 112 housing units at an average density of 60.4 per square mile (23.3/km2), of which 54 (65.9%) were owner-occupied, and 28 (34.1%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 1.8%; the rental vacancy rate was 17.6%. 105 people (62.5% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 51 people (30.4%) lived in rental housing units.”

In other words, Albion is very, very tiny and lies along coastal California State Highway-1, some 15 miles south of Fort Bragg and about 9 miles south of the artsy-schmartzy ‘art colony’ that is historic old Mendocino Village.

Albion was first settled in the mid-1850s and soon grew to include a lumber business and a large mill. A wharf, extending out into the ocean from the nearby Navarro River site, also enabled a small local fishing industry to thrive. When the 1929 economic crash occurred, Albion was severely impacted as so many other urban areas were, but a small core community managed to survive nevertheless and in the early 1970s saw the development of a colony of would-be neo-Bohemians who many would characterise as ‘Hippies’ (known as ‘The Albion Tribe’). Today, some half-a-century later, Abion continues to exist peacefully and unobtrusively as part of the beautiful Mendocino seacoast, although the relatively cheap land that existed there during the Depression is now valued at bazillions of dollars (if and when it is even made available to buy).

One of the most beautifully scenic parts of Albion is a section with cottages, settled along a ridge named Navarro Ridge that overlooks the ocean mouth-end of the Navarro River; it is there on the Navarro Ridge Road that a unique dwelling exists among them called the ‘Wine Barrel House.’

Believe it or not, the Wine Barrel House was built out of a huge 50s vintage oaken winery storage barrel that was taken out of service several decades ago and sold as surplus goods. As is a common practice in the wine storage operations of a vintner, oaken barrels are used to store wine because over a period of several years the oak imparts a unique, characteristic resiny flavoring to the wine contained therein. However, over the years, this resin residue subsides and the barrel is taken out of service and replaced (in modern winery operations by stainless steel aging tanks, instead of old oaken casks). This was the case with the barrel that the Wine Barrel House was built from.

I estimate the original barrel was roughly 16-18 feet in diameter at its widest part and about 30-35 feet tall, and from that barrel a two-story coastal vacation home was constructed. The interior is today largely true to the original barrel-like cylinder of the cask but an rear extension on the second floor contains a fully equipped kitchen and below it, on the first floor, another small extension enabled a modern bathroom to be added (containing a shower/bath, toilet and sink/vanity area). The solid oaken walls of the original barrel must have been about 2-3 inches thick and the scored inside surface of those walls has been left exactly as it was when the barrel contained wine, with no cosmetic, internal resurfacing.

Naturally, a modern electrical system, plumbing and the usual inner dwelling fittings have all be added and on the second floor there is a cast-iron, wood-burning fireplace, comfortable furnishings (along with a fully equipped kitchen, as already mentioned). Water coomes from a deep on-site well and waste is managed in a septic tank system.

In the front of the barrel (as it were), large paned-glass windows have been added that afford both upper and lower floors a spectacular view of the Navarro River’s mouth and the Pacific Ocean beyond. At dusk, when the fog is out, it provides an absolutely breathtaking scene to behold and…as the property owner describes it…a truly ‘a romantic setting.’

A very comfortable, supportive queen-sized bed fills one quarter of the lower floor space, along one wall and there is a desk area and a comfortable chair adjacent to it for taking in the view. A staircase runs up the south inner wall of the structure, joining the lower and upper floors.

Directly adjoining the lower floor on the south-east side of the building is a wonderfully private, enclosed garden area that contains a modern hot-tub/spa. The fence around it is constructed of old, weathered wood and there are gates at the front and in the rear wall (that leads to a nearby grassy parking area). As such, it is ‘dog-proofed’ for all small dogs and unless one has a fence-jumping larger breed of dog, it is perfect for safely letting one’s unleashed dog out to sniff & squirt to its heart’s content! Since I have an older (17 years old) female Husky whose jumping days are over and done with, no worries there, either!

Very recently, my wife and I, plus our Husky girl spent a delightful 5 days relaxing at this quaint and pleasingly quirky get-away venue in Albion. Since it was off-season (between Memorial Day and Thanksgiving), the rates are specially adjusted (lower) and the per/night rate is thus only about $185 or so per/night (in-season it goes up to about $220/night)

Coincidentally, October and early November are my favorite months of the year to take a holiday anyway, since people’s kids are all back in school and the temporary migration madness that accompanies the Thanksgiving holidays has yet to occur. Further, given the stunning beauty of Fall among the deciduous trees and coastal Sequoia Redwood Sempervirons found in Mendocino, this area is simply unbeatable for getting away from the noisy crowds, the annoying motorhome travelers (with their house-size RVs) and the others who frequent such areas at other times of the years, and during the height of the summer vacation period.

As for food options, since the Wine Barrel House is equipped with a fully modern kitchen area, one can either eat at home or go out to eat at either of the two very fine restaurants in Albion. One of these is the Albion River Inn and the other is Ledford House, both situated in Albion along Highway-1, and both are open most of the year for fine dining. The entrees are excellent, as is the selection of good wines (including some excellent Alexander Valley vintages that are quite superb, by my oenophilic reckoning).

If you wish, you can even make a brief trip up to Mendocino Village (15 miles north of Albion) on Highway-1, where a further selection of dining options await (albeit ‘pricey, since simple burgers start at about $21 and gasoline at the Village’s funky old gas station on Main Street is about $10/gallon!). Everything else in Mendocino village is priced accordingly. Still, it’s well-worth the slight extra expense, given the setting, the bracing coastal climate and the scenic delights that await at every turn. Truly, the northern California Coast that stretches between Mendocino’s northern and southern boundaries, is one of the state’s best-kept favorite locales for native Californians who tend to have a much better grasp of where such things are to be found than most tourists who merely pass through, en route to elsewhere.

And of course, a few miles further north of the Village lies historic Fort Bragg, with even more varieties of experiences and dining to be had. In short, life in these parts is indeed good!

The only unhappy news, if there is any to be told, is that the wealthy folks who constitute the uppermost 3% of our population seem to have literally bought up the entire available coastal real estate in recent years, thus insuring the fact that ‘ordinary’ wage-earners’ and retirees (such as wifie and I) will never be able to realistically buy property of any kind in this lovely part of the state, short of winning a Powerball Lottery Megaprize!

Back in the 70s, many of my friends who weren’t actual hippies but who embraced the aesthetics of the hip, proto-Bohemian ‘alternate lifestyle’ ethic, did in fact relocate to Mendocino County, purchase cheap, small acreages in the local coastal Mendocino hills and were thus light-years ahead of the curve on that score. Impossible to do that today, naturally enough. Now, those of us who didn’t avail this alternative are forever doomed to paying some property-owner for the privilege of chilling briefly amidst this area’s scenic splendors, for a costly few nights.

Happily enough, for two people and a pup, there are still a few options to avail such as the fabulously quaint, romantic get-away known as ‘The Wine Barrel House’ in Albion! Frankly I can’t think of a better venue for a young couple in love than this enticing little bit of scenic Heaven-on-Earth (or even for old-geezers-in-training)!

Lastly, getting back to the subject of my lifelong love of good wine for a second, now that I’m a bit far along the trail of life, I have voluntarily forsaken ETOH (of any kind), so while drinking good wine is no longer an option on my table, at least I can experience it vicariously by staying in a wine barrel, as a paying guest every now and then, LoL!

Who knows? I might even be able to get a ‘contact high’ by taking deep breaths directly next to the inner walls of the place!

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PS: I am normnally reluctant to divulge my special 'secret' getaway refuges to the public like this, but if anyone is interested in arranging a stay at Wine Barrel House, you may contact Pat or Leslie at Robison Properties (the co-owners and managers of several such lovely little places as this in Mendo Co).

You can easily dial them up on-line, but reservations are best advised WELL in advance (at least several months).