Tag Archives: Napier

Wine Tasting Tour – Mar 19

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Mission Estate

Today we went for a highly extravagant all-day wine tasting tour. We were due to be picked up at 9.15, but nobody came, so just before 9.30 I rang Odyssey to find out what was happening. We had booked after the office had closed and somehow they had missed our online booking. By 9.50 their Graham had arrived and picked us up. We were the only two on this trip, though we were to be joined after lunch by another eight who were doing the afternoon session.

Presently I am hazy about the six wineries we visited and brewery, it will be filled in before I publish after I receive confirmation of where we visited. In all we tasted some 36 different wines, so you can perhaps sympathize. Yes they did provide us with a list, it was the fourth winery which R and I have little recollection of.

The first place was Moana Park, a small boutique vineyard which produces wine with no animal products (finings are often being made from egg white or fish entrails). They also use the minimal amount of sulphur dioxide in their wines. It was a small place which produces only about 20,000 bottles a year. We loved the rosé and the white wine with the German sounding grape, Gewursztraminer. Turns out the grape has Italian origins. So much so that we bought a bottle of rosé, and Odyssey bought us a bottle of the white to compensate for the mess up on the start of the tour. Very kind.

The next stop was the Wine Museum, actually the Church Road vineyard in action, but with a museum documenting the founder’s wine making. Here we had another tasting of six wines, after a walk around the working winery, and a gaze at the museum. 

(I should say the tasting amount of wine is about a tablespoon in a big glass. You are encouraged to swirl and sniff. There was a spittoon at all establishments, but we did not make use of any of them.)

Our next stop was the Mission Estate which was founded in 1851 (they claim to be the oldest winery in NZ) by French Catholic missionaries & is still owned by the Catholic church. It is now is a restaurant and function room. Here we had an excellent meal, I had lamb with some feta and an olive paté.  Rosemary had chicken.  Included in the meal was a glass of wine (oh no!).  A Fantail bird chased amongst the vines on the pergola under which we dined, and a small cat stared pointedly at two fellow diners. After the meal we had a wine tasting. Quite out of character, we found ourselves buying a half bottle of a delicious dessert wine – be warned, Christmas guests.

Our tour operator arrived back, he had been ferrying the afternoon participants around. He drove us back to the first place to pick up the six Brummie friends and two girls from Melbourne.

Here is all gets hazy, and what is filled in is the result of diligent research

We visited TeAwa, and I can’t remember anything about this. (Rosemary claims she can, but she would say that, wouldn’t she?)

We then visited a sizeable vineyard, Sileni, that actually has its wine sold in the UK in Tesco and Waitrose. It was, I think, a Sauvignon Blanc. (I have a picture of the label.) A very reasonable wine.

(There was much wine technical talk of Gimblett Gravels (largish pebbles) versus a red soil, red metal, but my brain has failed to retain the information.)

Our final stop was at another very small vineyard, the Oak Estate, operated by a young German couple. It is their first year of selling at the cellar door. Here we stopped for a platter of cold meats, bread and dips, along with several wines to taste.

The Melbourne girls had elected to go to a brewery instead of the meal. So, after we had eaten, we picked them up, and some of us chaps had to inspect the brewery where I purchased a litre of very palatable, well-hopped IPA, which even R when sampled the next day.

Back at the campsite we went for an evening walk along the estuary shore looking for birds, disturbing a few white faced Herons.  Back at the campsite for our staple of cheese and Vegimite rolls.

 

Napier – Mar 18

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Napier

We left the campsite and headed to Napier. After the first 18K on gravel roads we hit the sealed roads and then the State Highway and made very good progress. I have great difficulty in keeping the van to 100kph on these roads and often found myself well-exceeding the limit with everyone else around. I think I am now over my initial problems with driving on the left. Logic tells me, cos we are on holiday and it is (sometimes) hot, I should be driving on the right. A right-hand drive car does not deter me, cos that’s what I’d be driving normally.

We stopped for a coffee and a stuffed sausage (how could anyone resist such a wonderfully-named delicacy?). It the Midway Café, where there were four tabby kittens. Rosemary fell in love with these.

Arrived at Napier and checked out a few campsites as we drove into town. The first one I had chosen was closed, washed out in the previous week’s floods. We found one which was decently near to town, but could be noisy as near an intersection.

Parked near the coast where there was a car boot type market in progress, didn’t buy anything despite the odd looking vegetables on sales. Then it was into town and a nice bookshop where Rosemary bought a book on birds of New Zealand. (Promptly lost a few hours later at the Irish bar.) We wandered around the town taking the odd pictures of the Art Deco buildings destroyed by the additional canopies and air conditioning units.

There seemed to be a large number of coffee shops and a distinct lack of bars. Eventually homed in on the Irish bar for lunch/supper and a few beers. Was nice sitting out on the street in the warm weather, (had started the day distinctly looking cloudy). I didn’t like the sign next to a clothing shop announcing autumn and the time to buy wet weather gear.

Back out of town to the campsite where we are parked next to the kids playground, hopefully none of the rugrats are around. R excited at the prospect of flush toilets & showers.