Santa Barbara - Santa Barbara
SOCAL = An area where French elegant style wine can be made in Southern California
Santa Barbara, which is about 2 hours north of the coastline from Los Angeles, is a famous tourist spot with beautiful buildings based on red roofs and white walls that make you feel the remnants of Spain, and a pier called Pier Pier.
SOCAL (an abbreviation for Southern California) is a relatively cool region in Southern California, with a maximum temperature of around 25°C even in summer . The weather is also very good, and it's the most pleasant area with more than 300 sunny days a year, just like any other SOCAL city!
By the way, about the wine there, taking advantage of the cool climate, it is characterized by winemaking that follows the style of the so-called cool regions of the so-called Old World such as France and Germany. It is famous as a region that has drawn a line.
But why is it cool even though it's in the south of California?
The secret lies in the unique geography of the Santa Barbara area. The coastline is one of the few areas in California that runs east-west, and the valleys run east-west as well. This is a terrain found only in Santa Barbara , from Southern California to the West Coast all the way to Washington.
As you can see in the bird's-eye view below, the red-transparent part extends from east to west. The three valleys that are indispensable when talking about wine in the Santa Barbara region, Santa Maria Valley, Los Alamos Valley, and Santa Ynez Valley from the north, all run east to west, sucking in the cold winds of the California Current and creating gaps between urban buildings. Yanaka is cooled by the principle of wind .
As an aside, the Academy Award-winning wine comedy film Sideways, set in Santa Barbara, is purportedly named after this shoreline, but it's actually 'shoreline' . Instead, it is a "valley" !
In addition to the "Santa Barbara Winery", which was born as the first winery in Santa Barbara in 1962, various talented producers such as Obon Climat, which is famous for Pinot Noir, and Ohai Vineyard , which was separated from Obon Clima , have gathered. With 275 wineries, 7 AVAs (legally recognized wine-producing areas), and more than 70 grape varieties, SOCAL is a major wine-producing area.
