2024 Pinotage harvest in Lodi’s Mokelumne River AVA.
Guest post by Bob Highfill
Lodi Wine welcomes guest contributor Bob Highfill, asked to share his personal list of “2024’s ten most interesting wines” grown in Lodi because of his unique perspective. Bob himself might cite his prior experience as a newspaper wine columnist for Stockton’s The Record, a brief stint as Marketing and Communications Manager for the Lodi Winegrape Commission and his current status as the Lodi focused online wine columnist for Stocktonia.org.
What impresses us most, though, is the fact that he spent most of his prior 27 years at The Record as a sports reporter and the daily newspaper’s sports editor; not to mention previous stops as sports director of KGW Radio and as a securities broker at Dean Witter.
Bob Highfill.
Which is to say, when Bob talks wine, you can bet it comes from the perspective of a truly enthusiastic aficionado of wine, not so much as a jaded professional with an unspoken agenda. Like many a pure lover of wine, he still treasures that “first moment”⏤for him, a bottle of Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir experienced over dinner in Carmel.
Since then, Mr. Highfill has explored wine regions far beyond Lodi and earned certificates as a CSW (Certified Specialist of Wine) and a WSET 3 (Wine & Spirit Education Trust). When not quenching his thirst for more knowledge, he works part-time at the Lodi Wine Visitor Center with associates with just as much thirst and
