The rest of the trip was brilliant, by the way, filled with lunches and dinners and gallons of Barolo. One hundred percent nebbiolo. In the place where it was grown, harvested and made into wine. With food from that very place to match it. This was a part of harvest I could get used to. I decided I did not need to see those fields up close for the rest of the trip. Driving through the rolling region and watching the picturesque rows click by on the way to lunch or dinner would be enough for me. I gained a new respect for people who prune and pick.

Then I met Larry Levine, the man in charge of Sonoma County Grape Camp. There are many reasons to go to Sonoma County Grape Camp, and Larry is one of them. He is always happy, he never says no, he drinks as much as you do, as late as you do, and he never appears hungover the next day. He is the guy who tells you it is time to get on the bus and the guy who tips you off to a special wine that is being poured—right over there, so go get a taste before it’s drained.   

When I told Larry about my grape-picking reservations he promised me Sonoma would be different. It’s supervised, he said. You’ll learn something, and you won’t be picking all day, and it will all tie together—the picking, the planting, the grafting, the irrigating, the drinking, the eating, the stomping, the blending, the drinking, the eating, the drinking, the eating….

He was right. I actually enjoyed harvesting grapes in Sonoma because it was like a big party. There were a couple dozen of us out there for an hour or two at a time and I never felt like I had to produce. Questions were lobbed regularly at Larry and the winemakers—questions I could listen for the answers to, or ignore completely and watch a hawk ride the currents above my head. I learned that some pickers make as much as $72 an hour, depending on how much they pick. I could see them in the distance, working their way through the rows, dropping several bunches at a time into bins. If that was a $72-an-hour pace, or even a $50-an-hour pace, I might clear a buck today. But that’s okay, I’m on vacation.

That is exactly what Sonoma County Grape Camp is—a vacation. There’s learning, but you learn only as much as you want to learn. You could ignore every bit of information sent your way and just drink and eat your way through the three-day affair. No one would judge you for that—least of all, Larry.

One might wonder why someone would sign up for Grape Camp and plop down the $1,750 if that someone did not want to learn at least a few things about the grape growing and/or winemaking process. But in truth the amount and variety of wines that are available to Grape Campers, the accommodations, transportation (ie, designated drivers) and food, are probably worth the tuition alone. The facts and figures, and the free-form Q&A sessions with winemakers are pretty much thrown in for free.

One night Gina Gallo served us dinner and poured wines for us at her family’s estate. She literally placed plates of food in front of us, and filled our glasses. I felt like saying, “Really, you don’t need to do that—I can pour my own wine.” But I know how people in the wine world are; they aim to please, especially in their own homes. That is how GianLuca Viberti was in Barolo. He took us to a special dinner up in the hills and carried with him three bottles of wine, which he poured for us at our table.  

Another day in Sonoma, at a time in the morning when I wouldn't normally drink wine, we found ourselves in a vineyard with Ulises Valdez. You have perhaps heard of the winemaker’s patience. Valdez lacks that, to a degree, which is why when we visited the crush facility he uses, in an industrial park in Santa Rosa, he uncorked some of his finest bottles for us.

“Why do you want to keep the good wine for tomorrow,” Valdez said, filling my glass. “It’s like old guys say, ‘Don’t buy green bananas—you never know.’”

I’ll drink to that, Ulises. I drank a lot to that, and before long I was calf-high in cold zinfandel grapes, Lucy-style, with another glass of zinfandel in my hand. Come to think of it, I was ready for some lunch. So you see how Grape Camp goes?

On another day we had lunch in a city park with cheese entrepreneur Cindy Callahan of Bellwether Farms. Her first customer, more than 20 years ago, was the legendary Alice Waters restaurant Chez Panisse in Berkeley.

“We never had a business plan,” Callahan said. “We just sort of did what we thought was right.”

Whatever your politics or tolerance for risk are, when you are having lunch in a beautiful park with a little breeze passing through, and dozens of wine selections at arms-reach, when someone makes that kind of proclamation, you tend to believe that many things are possible, starting with the very next day.

After lunch we had coffee that was roasted, brewed and poured by Ecco Caffe owner Andrew Barnett, a Chicago native who relocated to Sonoma and now operates a certified organic coffee roasting operation. Campers sipped coffee and relaxed on picnic benches. One Camper sprawled out on the grass and hardly got a second look from anyone. There was a nice breeze, and it was warm. The setting helped me realize that I now know for sure that I do not want to work a wine grape harvest for real. Anywhere.

But I would go back to Grape Camp this year. And I would pick grapes for an hour or two every morning just to work off the sting of the night before’s overindulging. Somehow, bending and snipping does work off the sting of the night before. Of course you could go through Grape Camp without ever feeling any sting. Like I said, you can go in whole hog or you can stare at hawks riding the thermals above the vineyards. You can guzzle gallons, or you can sip, sip, sip with an ever-present bottle of water in your hand, thanks to Larry. You can ask geeky questions about soil or grafting or just zone out and snap close-up pictures of pinot noir leaves as everyone else gets educated.

Whatever you want to do, if you want to do it in the fall of 2010, now is the time to book your spot because they fill up quickly and Larry can only keep track of so many campers no matter how loudly he blows his whistle. Yes, he blows a whistle now and then. It’s camp, remember? But as far as I can remember he never blew that thing before the middle of the afternoon, which is one more reason to love Grape Camp.

DETAILS: Sonoma County Grape Camp, Sept. 27-29, 2010. $1,750 per person includes hotel accommodations for two nights at the Vitners Inn, all meals, tastings and transportation during camp.To enroll, call 707-522-5860 or visit www.sonomagrapecamp.com.