Grape Juice Goodness

After what must have been one of the smoothest crossings of the Cook Straight in the history of Cook Straight Crossings, we decided to take a few days to relax and enjoy the city where are journey began. Nothing much had changed in Wellington, except the weather was nicer. Also, a rugby team was selling hot sausages as a fundraiser on Tory St., and their work apparently drew the attention of the same disapproving lady who haunted the dreams of Buttercup in the days leading up to her forced marriage to Prince Humperdink. Surely we don't need to explain this reference.

Sausage Sizzle!!! Boooooo!!!

Other than that, all was well in Wellington, and our sorrow over leaving the South Island was lifting quickly. After all, we had a whole new island to explore, and we still had a few days before we had to arrive at our new place of employ, so we planned one last splurge of a trip to the most Art Deco-tastic city in the eastern hemisphere: Napier!

Now, you're probably wondering "Why Napier?" Well, if you'll cool your jets, we'll get to that. As some of you may know, New Zealand has a booming wine industry. As far as wine-producing nations go, it's still pretty new to the game, but the country has made a big name for itself in a short amount of time. Also, as some of you may know, Kelcy & Matt enjoy their beverages. We are still fairly young in our wine expertise, but since we quit smoking, our taste buds have recovered enough that we can tell they put some grapes and stuff in there, and that's all we need to consider ourselves sommeliers. Napier lies in Hawke's Bay, a terroir of growing distinction that is producing some of the finest wines in the world. And if you show up to the cellar doors with a proper shirt and shoes, you can get it free, and you ain't gotta spit it out or nothin!

So after a few relaxing days in Wellington, we began our journey up the much more crowded North Island. On the South Island, you regularly go an hour between tiny towns and villages with little but farmland in between. On the North Island, many stretches feel like you never leave some sort of populated area. Or at least that was the case for the first few hours. As we neared the east coast, the sprawl thinned out a little bit as we entered the beginnings of wine country, until finally, like the green light at the end of Daisy Buchanan's dock, Napier appeared as a beacon in the distance, heralding a promising era (or weekend) of free wine and 30's architecture.

On a quick historical side note, Napier is dubbed the Art Deco capital of New Zealand. This is not, as we originally thought, because Napier used to be in Miami, but because in 1931, the city was leveled by an earthquake, and when the time came to rebuild, Art Deco was the hot new style, and if you drive by the McDonalds in modern-day Napier, it still is.

On to the free wine. We picked up a handy map from the local information site that mapped out the bountiful array of local wineries and set out to take our taste buds on a fantastic voyage. Our first stop was at one of the larger New Zealand wineries. We drove up to a large estate house that wasn't very clearly marked as to where you were supposed to go, so we just uncomfortably strolled through the biggest doors we could find. Being our first foray into the classy world of free booze, we weren't exactly sure of the decorum. Were we supposed to sign up somewhere? Did we have to pass a breathalyzer first? If we tried something we didn't like, could we ask for a free sample of something better? Was it tacky to ask if there was any free beer available as well?

We quickly discovered that cellar door wine tastings are not as similar to Señor Frogs as we had imagined. The bartender doesn't line up shots of Viognier, you aren't given a funnel at the door that'll later be used to pour Marzemino down your gullet, and nothing you imbibe is set ablaze before it is served to you. What does happen is you have to do a lot of listening and nodding along and saying things like, "Yes, I do detect the coriander," or "Mmmmmmm, tangy!" If you're particularly bold, you may occasionally make an assertion, such as "I'm picking up a waft of broccoli casserole," to which at least one person in the group will adamantly agree: "Yes yes yes yes, I was just noticing rapini on the back of the tongue." "Yeah, whatever."

But enough poking fun at the wine tasting experience. We really had a fantastic time. Our favorite winery was a very small operation which was run out of a barn by a couple with a beautiful yellow lab that hung out at our picnic table while the owners brought wines to us one at a time. We were the only people there for a good portion of our visit, and they were happy to spend time talking with us and telling us all about their business.

We ended up visiting four wineries, and after buying several bottles of our favorites, our free wine-tasting tour quickly became quite expensive. But, we thought it was well worth it. Now we've got enough 2008 broccoli casserole in the cellar to last us all winter!