Mmm, wine

Slightly sozzled (only slightly) after a day's wine tasting in the McLaren Vale and the Adelaide Hills. A small tour group, which was nice, and a mixture of ages and nationalities, also nice. We did five wineries, morning tea, olive oil tasting and lunch. The McLaren Vale's not too far outside Adelaide; it has around 85 wineries apparently but most of them are boutique, small family-owned businesses rather than the multi-national conglomerates.

First stop after morning tea was the Fox Creek winery where we had a tour of their very modern sheds before tasting several whites and I think seven reds, including a fizzy Shiraz which was yummy. After that, Woodstock Wines (named after the Oxfordshire village) – I particularly liked their expensive $60 Shiraz and their dessert wines, but the grenache rosé was pretty good too. We had lunch at Woodstock, one of those antipasto platter affairs.

The next two wineries after lunch – Hugo Wines in McLaren Vale and Petalumba in the Adelaide Hills – made me worry I'd drunk too much because they weren't as good. Not terrible, just not quite as good as the first two. Luckily winery number five was superb. Arranmore Wines is a tiny little operation producing 1000 cases a year and run by one man, who knew his stuff and made excellent wines. Up there it's colder than down in the vale, so the wines reminded me far more of the stuff I've been drinking in NZ – especially as he makes a rather nice pinot noir. A good last stop actually.

Off up to Alice Springs tomorrow. I hear it's hot.