Day 334/365 My advent calendar starts tomorrow

Day 100/365 Help somebody with their computer problems then courier arrives the next day

Day Nine 2015 Moet for my birthday

Day 196 it's Bastille Day

Day 194 Best part of the conference

Sangria at lunch

Day 117 My present from China

Day 79 Red, Red Wine

Day 23 Lunch at Villa Maria

Day 10 A couple of the fine wines we had at the birthday party

Coleraine Cab/Merlot 1994 and Tom 1998

Day 135 A very expensive bottle of wine

Jim Barry's 'che Armagh' Shiraz is considered to be one of Australia's foremost wines...and we enjoyed it!

Day 24 En route to Hawkes Bay, stop over in Gisborne

Views of Gisborne

Today has been all about vineyards. Gisborne was the place to visit in the mid nineties to the early 2000s for wine tastings and exceptional food. There has been a lull for the last few years but Gisborne is back! There are boutique wineries with passionate owners who want to talk to you about their wines, and vineyards are marrying this with food that compliments and improves the wine tasting experience.
We visited 3 wineries today. The first winery Bushmere is fairly new (around 4-5 years old for cellar door, meals and music) the owner David Egan did an awesome tasting session combining food with the wine. The wine was excellent particularly the chardonnays.

Millton was next. It is renowned for its bio-dynamic wines, which is a method of growing where there is no fungicide, herbicide or soluble fertilisers used. It is totally organic. My favourites were the Chenin Blanc and the Opou Chardonnay.

The 3rd vineyard was Matawhero, this was a place I used to visit regularly in the nineties, it was a very rustic and wild setting (as was the owner Denis Irwin). Matawhero's claim to fame was the pioneering of Gewurztraminer in the 70's. which gave them international acclaim and it was reported that the Queen even drank it.
The vineyard and winery was taken over by the Searle family in 2008 and has been revitalised.

This photo shows the old cellar where a lot of the earlier wine is stored.

Day 18 'Wine Time'

Today was my first day back in the office after a month's holiday. It was hot and humid and I needed to clear a path to my computer, and I really needed to clean up the office.
Conclusion: I can get to the computer now but I only cleared a 1/4 of the office. I did manage to write a new blog post on one of my other blogs, answered some emails, posted on twitter, printed some of my books...so at 6 O'clock I decided it was 'Wine Time'.

This is one of Villa Maria's everyday easy drinking Chardonnays. Villa Maria is my most favourite vineyard and is bound to appear in many more posts to this 365 blog.