The Alex & The Eleanor + 1

Dec. 28 2007
Napier – Hawkes Bay wine region
Sunny and warm…. To start

As is becoming an odd new habit for us, we are out for breakfast by 8:30, and then head down to Hastings and hope the On Yer Bike wine tour has bikes to spare. Luckily they do, and we off biking at about 10:30. The path starts out on the road, and we hit Triangle Red, which has a couple of different vineyards wine to taste,  I think my favorite is the Bushwick Pinot Gris. Not a grape we generally like, but this a very light, crisp wine that would be excellent drinking very cold in then summer. Interestingly, they also have some Malbecs, which was not something I had heard of from NZ. With good reason it turns out, they are rather thin and not great. Next is Ngatarawa,  where my winner is a Late Harvest, we actually get a couple bottles of this. Next we bike through some olive groves and grapes to Hatton Estate, which does not try to compete with the big winieres with huge tasting rooms, this is just a shed, with a number of stainless vats. Its rather cool actually. My favorite was the EC2, a Chardonnay! Yes yes, I know, the world must be ending if Eleanor likes a Chardonnay, but it was unoaked, so its ok. Next was Te Awa, which was the first of the big boy wineries, stuff that can be found in the States without too much trouble. I liked the Syrah and the Chardonnay both. They have a restaurant that looked quite nice, but we had a pack lunch and a lot of big meals ahead of us. Right next door is Trinity Hill, another beautiful building and lots of unusual Italian varitiels, which I do not know well enough to be able to tell if I did not like the grape or it was not a good expression of it. What I did like, a whole lot, was the Hawkes Bay Sauvignon Blanc, the winner of the day I would say, and the best part about it is that it is available through a US distributor, so its not $25 a bottle to ship it home (esp. since it’s a $15 bottle!) They also have a Noble Viognier, another sticky which isn’t available in the states, so we picked up a couple of bottles. After stopping to eat lunch, we head to Sileni, another big one, with a nice Chardonnay and my favorite Merlot of the day. Its suppose to be the best red of the area, but I can’t say I am a huge fan of it most of the time. Sadly it started to rain while we were at Sileni, but it was light, so we went off to our next and last stop, Alpha Domus, another very small tasting in the barn set up. Pretty much as soon as we get there the sky opens up and it begins to poor. I can’t say I was particularly fond of any of the wines, the Rose was not bad, not a huge fan though. Since the rain does not seem like its going to let up, we call back to base and they pick us up. Not a bad way to go really. We then head back up to Napier to check out Mission Hill, which we heard had great stickies. Can’t say I was a huge fan, a very pretty building though, and we see a wedding about to happen. Next door is Church Street, which has a very nice Sauvignon Blanc that we pick up a bottle of. We then race back down to Cape Kidnappers to get to Kim Crawford before 6 when it closes. Luckily our sense of directions and skill at reading maps has improved and we get there with enough time to enjoy. And there was a lot to enjoy -  not that that was a surprise, it is a wine I have enjoyed before – the unoaked chardonnay and the Marlbourough Sauvignon Blanc were good, and we got a bottle of a single vineyard Sauv. Blanc that wasn’t tasting, but doesn’t export so we’d better try it when we can. We drove a bit further down to Cape Kidnappers and stuck our feet in the Pacific just to say we could, no Gannets though, that will have to wait till the next time (heehee). We headed back to Napier and our room and a spot of dinner – takeaway fish and chips in our room. The blue cod was very good, and the spicy chips are too, though I am pretty sure I just don’t like the sweet potatoes here – the fries just tasted wrong, sorry, the chips just tasted wrong.