Last weekend we went shopping in Healdsburg and found a g
reat local grocery store: Big John’s Market. They have an excellent meat department, grass fed, high quality beef. The person at Toad Hollow Winery recommended this market and since we wanted to BBQ at home we had to see the meat department.
Well, I will go back: they cut just as much/little as you’d like, there is a great selection of grass fed beef, the they had lamb came from Davis CA.
Mirjam
One of the reasons Sonoma County is a great place to live is that it is close to some great national parks. While Yosemite is a block buster most tourist go first, I personally love Lassen Volcanic Park. It’s about 4 hours drive from Santa Rosa and is not as crowded as other parks. 
Great for hiking, backpacking, camping, swimming, fishing and cross country skiing in the winter time.
One of the hikes I personally loved was the hike to Bumpass Hell. The trail is beautiful with many wildflowers and Bumpass Hell itself is just gorgeous.
Mirjam
An other one of my favorite hikes is in Hood Mountain Regional Park. It is the hike to Gunsight Rock.
The trailhead we usually pick is of Adobe Canyon road. It’s a beautiful and steady hike up with beautiful views it’s easy to see San Pablo bay looking south. The Gunsight Rock Overlook is of Nattkemper trail. The trail we take is a 4 hour hike, almost 3 hrs up and about 1 hr down hill.
The hike 
up might seem long but the view of Gunsight rock is worth it and the hike down is a breeze.
It’s very close to Kenwood, a quaint little village in Sonoma Valley.
Mirjam
While you will find the usual coffee chains in Sonoma County –Starbucks, Peets-, we have some local places that are worth a try. One of them is Flying Goat coffee. You will find them on 
3 locations in Sonoma County: 2 stores in Healdsburg and one in Santa Rosa.
Besides great coffee they have a great selection of pastries. Their selection is not huge but what they have is delicious. It’s locally made and the gluten free pasties are super delicious too… and that is unusual…;)
For those how like a good cup of coffee, Flying Goat is worth a try.
Mirjam
When I moved to Santa Rosa about 12 years ago, I was recommended to try G&G market -a local grocery market- for their produce. And the recommendation was correct, I really like that store. Great selection, great produce. It is a store filled with interesting smells.
They have a great selection of not only produce but many other things. Due to my Dutch background I grew up with Sambal Oelek, an Indonesian condiment that is very hard to find. I found it at G&G. The same for some other products, one of them Maggi – a condiment great on rice dishes and eggs.
You will find G&G market has 2 locations in Sonoma County, one in Petaluma and one in Santa Rosa.
Mirjam
The options for organic food are abundant. Besides the local farmers markets there are some great farm stands too. One is Tierra Vegetables: they are not officially organic but are called sustainably farmed. Personally I LOVE their strawberries. They are really sweet and right now they have lots of them. They also shell their own beans, great place to check out when you are in the area, they are off Airport Blvd.
And if you like to explore and prepare what’s in season: 
Foggy River farms does a weekly veggie box. It’s a great way to experiment with veggies that you normally would not choose. Enclosed the overview of what they sent, it gives you an idea of what’s in season at certain times of the year in Sonoma County.
Mirjam
Sonoma County has all the usual chains: Safeway, Raley’s Lucky’s etc so that’s easy. And there are 5 Whole Food stores: 2 in Santa Rosa, 1 in Sebastopol, 1 in Petaluma and 1 in Sonoma. The Whole Foods in Santa Rosa in the Coddingtown mall has a pub in it. Yes you read this right, there is a pub offering a constant changing selection of 
beers and wine by the glass. You can order from the deli menu to eat something or get something from the food that is already prepared section: salad, soup, pizza… And they have a great selection of super delicious desserts!
Get a beer or a glass of wine while getting your groceries…
Cheers!
Mirjam
Moving to a new area means new doctors, new health care providers etc etc. Where to start? Ofcourse a great start is looking at the list provided by your health insurance. Still, who to call???
As to chiropractors, I highly recommend Pisenti Chiropractic. Pat is extremely knowledgeable, his specialty is ART -Active Release Technique- . Over the years, Pat has done a wonderful job for not just yours truly but for many of my friends.
The office is at 2725 Mendocino Ave in Santa Rosa. The phone no: 707-544-5338.
Mirjam
Although there are about 490,000 residents in Sonoma County of which about 170,000 residents live in Santa Rosa, the area by itself is fairly rural. Besides agriculture, there is an abundance of nature to enjoy. There are 49 regional parks in Sonoma County.
One of my favorites is Shilo Ranch regional park. There is great hike, takes about 50 minutes with great views of the valley. 
Sorry, dogs are not welcome. Reason: they will disturb the natural habitat. Also a great place to go mountain biking and horseback riding. Hiking close to dawn or dusk is not recommended. This park is also the habitat of coyotes, bobcats and mountain lions. A friend of mine ran into a mountain lion once, he was not too happy about that;)
Yep, we love where we live;)
Mirjam
We all have our favorite restaurants and our favorite type of food. Personally I like smaller restaurants with really good(fresh) food. And the ambiance is super important
too. Right now my favorite restaurant is Diavola in Geyserville. It’s a small restaurant, they have a wood fired pizza oven and according to good friends of mine, the best pizza in Sonoma County. I personally didn’t care for their gluten free pizza, however, all the other dishes I had were delicious. The skirt steak I had was superb.The food is fresh, the menu changes seasonally.
Geyserville is just north of Healdsburg and from my perspective, it’s worth the drive. One of my favorite wineries has a tasting room a few doors down :Williamson wines. This tasting room is not always open, the main tasting room is in Healdsburg.
Life is good!
Mirjam
