Full House
Ray and Margaret had a full house Monday night. Oliver, the son of a friend from Sweden, arrived to spend some time helping them in their fig orchard. He arrived with 3 other Swedish girls, to everyone's delight, and we had a pleasant evening together.
Oliver tells us that you can buy a bus ticket for travelling around NZ forf about $600. It's a "hop on, hop off" system and he picked his up from another traveller who needed the money and so got it for only $200. The busses take you to local hostels and everywhere, we see signs welcoming backpackers. If the hostel is full, they'll phone the next nearest hostel and if there's space, they'll drive you there at no charge.
We did a few wineries late Monday morning after Hans got back from golfing (81) and the first place was St. Clair where some of the bottles were dressed up as Monks. I've seen tuxedos, but these were the first hooded monk bottles I've seen.
Margaret knows some of the local vintners and consequently, we were warmly welcomed by Helen at Hunters who gave us many generous tastings. Then we visited her husband Clarry Meane, who is the artist in residence at Hunters. He keeps his studio there with some of his gorgeous paintings. Many are done in a pointilism style reminiscent of the French Impressionist Monet. He makes a good living as an artist (his paintings sell in the four figures) which immediately puts him into a very select group of artists.
Our last tasting was at Framinghams and their claim to fame, other than delicious wines, was the hand-painted sink in the ladies' loo featuring two lovelies au naturel. We were invited to tour their wine library downstairs and noted that all their wines since 2003 use screw caps instead of corks. In fact, that's the trend down here, and it's a much better way of preserving the integrity of the wine.
But if a wine still goes off when it's capped instead of corked, does that mean it's screwed?
Oliver tells us that you can buy a bus ticket for travelling around NZ forf about $600. It's a "hop on, hop off" system and he picked his up from another traveller who needed the money and so got it for only $200. The busses take you to local hostels and everywhere, we see signs welcoming backpackers. If the hostel is full, they'll phone the next nearest hostel and if there's space, they'll drive you there at no charge.
We did a few wineries late Monday morning after Hans got back from golfing (81) and the first place was St. Clair where some of the bottles were dressed up as Monks. I've seen tuxedos, but these were the first hooded monk bottles I've seen.
Margaret knows some of the local vintners and consequently, we were warmly welcomed by Helen at Hunters who gave us many generous tastings. Then we visited her husband Clarry Meane, who is the artist in residence at Hunters. He keeps his studio there with some of his gorgeous paintings. Many are done in a pointilism style reminiscent of the French Impressionist Monet. He makes a good living as an artist (his paintings sell in the four figures) which immediately puts him into a very select group of artists.
Our last tasting was at Framinghams and their claim to fame, other than delicious wines, was the hand-painted sink in the ladies' loo featuring two lovelies au naturel. We were invited to tour their wine library downstairs and noted that all their wines since 2003 use screw caps instead of corks. In fact, that's the trend down here, and it's a much better way of preserving the integrity of the wine.
But if a wine still goes off when it's capped instead of corked, does that mean it's screwed?
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