Introducing Paso Robles’ First Fully Dedicated Wine Tour Vehicle

Pictured here: seven of my two-case-capacity cold bags that keep your wine tasting-room temp, even on our hottest days! I’ve been using this cold bag system for many years now. Total case capacity without impinging on the passenger area is 21 cases…252 bottles of wine. Sky’s the limit if you want to put cases in the passenger area!

It’s been quite a few years since I decided I was too old, and it was way too much work to move clients’ wine purchases (sometimes several cases) out of the summer heat into tasting rooms and barrel rooms. A search for a simple, cheap solution led me to a restaurant supply company selling the foam insulated bags you see in the photo. Happy to share where I’ve purchased these bags. By the way, the blue container on the left side is a 33 gallon trash can that’s fed by a chute from the passenger area. Who ever heard of a limo with a trash can that size before? I love this ride!

Scoring a New Wine Tour Vehicle…the Hard Way: Creating the Perfect Ride for Paso Robles…read more

JZ “The Wine Tour Guy”

John Ziegler – Host and wine tour “Rocket Scientist”

Since 2005 I’ve been actively doing wine tours in SB and SLO Counties, and have done 2,000 wine tours on the Central Coast. Being a first-call limo driver for high end boutique hotels like Santa Ynez Inn, Fess Parker Wine Country Inn, Hadsten House, Hotel Corque, Four Seasons Biltmore, and Bacara for many years kept my service skills well honed. I’ve done well over 500 wine tours in Santa Barbara County alone. My reputation has developed around planning high end wine tours with savvy, serious about wine clientele, plus my skills at delivering great wine experiences on the fly. Gradually my focus began to shift to small production, high quality boutique wineries. In 2009 I started freelancing my own tours as JZ Wine Tour Guy. This was at the midpoint of a 10-year staff writing gig with Pacific Coast Sportfishing Magazine, Newport Beach CA. Technical writing at a manufacturing company in Paso Robles brought me to North San Luis Obispo County in 2011. I immediately fell back into the limo thing after running into a winemaker friend who recommended me to a local transportation company. (More Information)