We're Thirsty For Wine!!!!

The latest big news from Christchurch, other than all the rugby matches and upcoming Waitangi Day, is that we found jobs. They’re not great, but we are going to give it a try for a while. You know those annoying people in the streets soliciting for charity? Yup, that’s us. Just no bell to ring all day. If it wasn’t for charity, we know we wouldn’t be up for hassling people in the streets. But since it’s for a good cause, we are willing to give it a try for a week. Although we may need to take a long lunch break on Monday to watch the Super Bowl. GO GIANTS!!!!!

After working a whole day and a half (hey, it’s been a while), we needed a break to do something touristy, so on Saturday we headed out on the Canterbury Winery Tour. Of course at home we live just a short trip away from the wineries, but we’ve never actually made it out for a tour and some wine tasting. Pretty much, our knowledge of wine is “like it” and “don’t like it.” We learned a lot, hung out with some really nice people and got to sample plenty of vino.

Our first stop was the “Mud House” (sounds appetizing, ay?). Our server was a guy from Florida doing something very similar to us. He got us thinking about doing some work on the vineyards (yes, we’re already looking for another job). Anyway, it seems that the specialty of the area is Reisling, which conveniently also seems to be our favorite. We picked up a bottle of Mud House to enjoy later.

Our next stop was Waipara Springs. The area is known as the Waipara Valley and it’s filled with vineyards (pronounced vin--YARDS). At this one, we were seated in a nice outside garden and the wait staff kept bringing over new wines for us to sample. Nice quiet setting right? Well, all of a sudden, the party carriage arrived. We heard them before we saw them. Up came a Clydesdale-drawn covered wagon with the sound system pumping “Baby Got Back.” We expected to see Duff Man holding the reigns, but no such luck. It was pretty surreal.

The rest of the day was pretty calm in comparison. We visited two more wineries and sampled a large variety of wines. Not surprisingly, Jen really enjoyed the sweeter wines especially the “Sticky” Reisling. We also discovered a new wine called Gewurztraminer that we had never heard of before. It was very good, also very sweet.
We shared the tour with an Aussie couple on their honeymoon, and a Kiwi couple whose daughter it turns out “flatted” with one of the Christchurch Ultimate players we’ve met. Small world!

We got home in time to catch the finals of the Wellington Rugby Seven’s international tournament. They play short games (15 minutes) with only 7 to a side. It really opens up the field and speeds up the game. In an exciting final, New Zealand beat Samoa by scoring a “try” in the final seconds. It was a really exciting match, easy to see why Rugby is so popular here. We are going to try to catch a game in a couple of weeks when the Super14 season starts. If it’s anything like what we’ve seen on TV, the crowd should be wild and we’ll have plenty of stories for you!

Hope everyone at home is doing well and a big CONGRATULATIONS to everyone’s favorite commenter, Tom and Nelly on their engagement!!!!