New Zealand Week 1

Posted on January 31, 2010 by nealmartin

Sorry for the lack of updates…busy, busy, busy. After arriving in Auckland after a 26-hour flight, it was straight onto the ferry to idyllic Waiheke Island and Stonyridge Vineyards for a tasting with winemaker/yogi Steve Wight, followed by a blind tasting of the island’s wines. It is like a paradise here. However, speak to the locals and look [...]

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Travelling Round The World – January 23rd-25th

Posted on January 25, 2010 by nealmartin

One thing I can never accuse myself of, is not working hard enough. Having just blind tasted 200 Clarets whilst simultaneously writing the tasting notes, notwithstanding writing up 750+ Burgundy 2008 notes,  I am heading off to New Zealand for the 2010 Pinot Noir Conference, where I am joining a panel of speakers including the [...]

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Southwold Tasting – January 20th-22nd

Posted on January 25, 2010 by nealmartin

For the last three days, I have been attending the annual “Southwold” Bordeaux tasting: a ritual inaugurated by Clive Coates in the early 1980s in order to blind taste a recent vintage from bottle as comprehensively as possible. Many famous writers have sat round a table debating the merits of “Wine Number 13” over “Wine [...]

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Monday 18th January

Posted on January 21, 2010 by nealmartin

Today is Lily’s birthday. Exactly five years ago this morning, I was driving through the streets of South London that were haemorrhaged with traffic, careering onto the right hand side of the road with my wife having contractions and threatening to make an irrepairable mess of the passenger seat en route to Kings College Maternity Ward. [...]

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Sunday 17th January – Little Angels/Little Devils

Posted on January 19, 2010 by nealmartin

It is the second day of Lily’s 5th birthday celebration weekend. Today, we have booked the “Little Angels” activity centre just outside Guildford, a multi-tired maze of multi-coloured slides, tubes, swings and bridges, a labrynth in which your cherubs can run riot without a care. It does not get off to a good start. Daisy falls asleep in [...]

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Saturday 16th January – 2 x Snow White

Posted on January 18, 2010 by nealmartin

It is Lily’s unofficial 5th birthday. Her real birthday is on Monday, but like the Queen she has so many pressing engagements that the celebrations must be spread over three days. Tomoko gives her one of her zillion presents: a reversible Snow White/Cinderella dress that naturally inspires her sister to don her own, which turns [...]

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Friday 15th January

Posted on January 18, 2010 by nealmartin

No Burgundy tastings today, which may explain my rather startled stated. I escort Lily into her school, flirt a little with her teacher because that is what dad’s are supposed to do (I think it is a discipline thing…as if being disciplined by our wives is not enough.) I do a bit of writing and [...]

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Thursday 14th January – Lesser Spotted Hugh Johnson, material girls, Batailley smorgasbord

Posted on January 17, 2010 by nealmartin

Hey, guess what? Right. Another Burgundy 2008 day, this time in the salubrious surroundings of Vintners Hall for OW Loeb. The merchant attracts an enviable array of wine glitterati: Jancis (pictured typing away on her laptop), Steven Spurrier and even the “Lesser Spotted Hugh Johnson”. I interrupt his tasting to probe him about Tokaji, since [...]

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Wednesday 13th January

Posted on January 17, 2010 by nealmartin

Just when the snow is melting to leave an ice-rink between home and station, another few inches of the white stuff is dumped on Guildford and its infrastructure immediately implodes. School is cancelled, which means by this rate Lily will graduate from university in about 2188, although bizarrely, Daisy’s kindergarten, which she was due to [...]

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Tuesday 12th January

Posted on January 15, 2010 by nealmartin

I take Lily to school in the morning. She slips over in a snow drift and gets ice in her Hello Kitty boots and who does she blame? Her dad. Hey, don’t blame me Lily, blame your school, which has opened its gates in such inhospitable conditions, coercing parents to struggle up the hill like [...]

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