VINEXPO - Will's trip - June 2007

Will has just got back from his trip to France. He spent 2 days at VINEXPO, the major annual wine trade fair in Bordeaux. This was a convenient opportunity to meet up with some of our existing winemakers:

Gilles Ferran from Domaine des Escaravailles in the Rhone, Pierre Jacolin from his domaine near Menetou-Salon and also Jean-Louis Trocard from Bordeaux to name a few. Jean-Louis put on a fantastic boat trip with dinner on board for fifty guests. A three hour trip which coincided with an electrical storm over the city. Jean-Louis had just lost about 30% of his vine crop in one of his vineyards from a storm a few days before, so while Will was enjoying the hospitality, J-L was looking a bit anxious. He did tell us that the reason why his son, Benoit, was looking rather pleased, however, was that his (Benoit's) property, Clos Dubreuil, had just been named in the top 3 domains in a St. Emilion tasting at VINEXPO.

While in Bordeaux, Will carried out a rare task given to him by one of our customers. The lady had a 1948 bottle of the top estate Chateau Yquem which was starting to leak. She wanted us to sell it but we advised her to get the problematic cork seen to first. Will duly turned up at the famous property where, after they had grandly declared it to be authentic, it was recorked.

Leaving Bordeaux and travelling south, Will next visited Clos Thou at Jurancon (near Pau), home of our fabulous moelleux, then Domaine de Bordes and finally Chateau Millet, our Armagnac producer. Here he was treated to a great evening which went on well into the night. Early next morning, he was forced to rise as he had to move his car to allow the mobile bottling articulated lorry to get in.

A good trip - a few new wines chosen and friendships re-kindled.

Cheers!

Post-Treasure Hunt Tasting

Yesterday afternoon a group, from a very well known national telecomms company, arrived for a tasting after having spent the earlier part of the day in two teams racing around Bath finding answers to questions in a treasure hunt team-building exercise. The men (miraculously) won although there is some dispute over the scoring process.

French Chardonnay, some Sauvignon Blanc, a Rioja, some Australian and our wine from Pic Saint Loup featured with, again, the Cabernet/Merlot Blue Cutting Road from O'Leary Walker getting the most nods of approval. Certainly no waresh (pronounced wiersh) wine there!

Tastings always bring surprises - People who don't normally drink a particular grape/style/colour find that there are always exceptions and it's these discoveries that are fun.

Regards and thanks to Jean and her group for the visit.

Cheers!

Family Gathering & Tasting

Last Saturday we had a great time with a family celebrating a birthday. A couple of generations and some appendages spent the evening here tasting a range of wines and of course Will's mum's tapenade and terrine. A few of the guests had been before so we chose a different lot to taste. The star, I think, was the O'Leary Walker Blue Cutting Road Cabernet/Merlot. I served this out of the fridge (it was a hot sticky day) and it was big, jammy and gorgeous.

Happy Birthday wishes again to the Dad and thanks for celebrating it here.

Cheers!

Ifor the TV Star

While we were skiving down at the Bath and West Show, Ifor was slaving away back at the shop being filmed for an episode of Cash in the Attic. No, he was not the subject of the week but the couple being filmed wanted to do a little wine tasting, so where better than at the Tasting Room?

For what will probably be a segment lasting only one minute, Ifor did his stuff for about 4 hours. When he's famous, I hope that he will still talk to us.

Cheers!

Royal Bath and West Show

After glorious weather while we were setting up our stall at the Bath and West Show, we arrived (soon after dawn broke) the next morning feeling it was more like an early February day. Cold and very wet. Great start. We were in a group of stalls under the "Best of Bath and Northeast Somerset" umbrella(!) next door to the main arena. We were sandwiched between the Bath Soft Cheese stall and Bath Aqua Glass, so great neighbours.

We took malt whiskies, Armagnacs, Cognacs, Somerset Apple Brandy and several other lines rather than wine this year, and we are very glad we did.

OK the weather was lousy the first day but it got better and better. We had a great time. We had various malts, some of them cask strength, open for tasting and judging by the level of sales, they obviously went down very well.

To sum up; a great show this year, the weather not stopping the crowds and very pleased with the results. We even enjoyed the mad American human cannonball!

By the way, we are having a Malt Whisky tasting at the end of this month - 28th June. Ring to book.

Cheers