The Sonoma List: 5 things that are uniquely Sonoma

Fore!

Other towns may have glitzy mini-golf courses but only Sonoma's 18-hole course boasts kid-sized replicas of Sonoma's historical buildings. Hole #3 is the Mission, #11 is City Hall. The cute spot has changed hands a few times in recent years but it is still independent and family-owned, and it is looking pretty spiffy these days. No one seems to remember who built the course but it has been amusing the young and young at heart in Maxwell Village since 1988. Tucked along the north side of Lucky's Supermarket and bordered on one side by park land, the Sonoma Family Fun Center course is surprisingly spacious as it winds back behind the supermarket. Less than $10 brings hours of amusement if you stay on to try your hand at a few arcade games. 19171 Sonoma Highway. Sonomafamilyfuncenter.com.

Lorna Sheridan

Tooterville

Plenty of towns have railroad histories and even historic 'train districts,' but Sonoma is one of the few that borders an actual town solely devoted to – and populated by – trains. TrainTown, located in its own non-city-limits island at 20264 Broadway, is 10-acres of kid (and adult-kid) heaven – replete with its own 4-mile ride on a quarter-scale railroad, plus fun on the Iron Horse Carousel, a mine-train coaster, a Ferris wheel, and it even has its own TrainTown Airlines (ultra-domestic distances only, folks). The mood is family steam punk; the fashions are dungaree-skewed; the faces are always smiling. Oh, and TrainTown's public transportation system is out of this world. Traintown.com.

Jason Walsh

Extra extra!

Not every town has an 8-acre central plaza, but even fewer towns have a twice-weekly paper. In fact you can count on one hand the number of twice-weeklies in California, and not even use your thumb. The Sonoma Index-Tribune started publishing in 1879, but went from a weekly to twice-a-week in 1985, according to former editor Bill Lynch. 'The Princeton Packet in New Jersey was the model we followed when we made the change,' he said. Recently retired publisher John Burns also pointed to two Sierra foothill papers, the Auburn Journal (Thursday and Sunday, starting in 2017) and the Paradise Post (Wednesday and Saturday). So the I-T is rare as a twice-weekly, and definitley unique in Sonoma!

Christian Kallen

Wine tool fans rejoice

Dangling from chains, strapped to bars and mounted on ancient stone walls a person with a certain type of imagination might think they've entered a torture chamber. But, it's really an homage to Sonoma's winemaking history. The Tool Museum, housed in Buena Vista Winery's third floor, is colorfully lit and the brainchild of a colorful man, Jean-Charles Boisset, the owner of the winery and tools. The collection, which is showcased by a light and sound show, comes from Europe, some from Boisset's own family's viticulture history in France. Buena Vista was established in 1857 and is considered California's first premium winery.

Anne Ward Ernst

Thirst Trap

Almost everywhere else you go in California, being in public with an open container of alcohol will earn you a lecture and a $250 fine. But not Sonoma! Here, it is legal to wander the Sonoma Plaza with libations in hand, from 11:30 a.m. till sunset every day of the year. The city's benevolent wine gods have decreed that it is always wine-thirty, and in the Plaza, that's taken to heart. You'd be hard pressed to pass through its eight leafy acres without finding somebody decanting some kind of juice, and — if you're a true Sonoman — that's alright.

Kate Williams