Days to Savor

As expected, Friday was fabulous. Please accept my apologies for bragging a bit, but I know this is the day/weekend I will have to reflect upon when I’m in the midst of my 7^th 12 hour overnight shift in a row… which will be the case in about 3 weeks time.

We started Friday morning with about 2 hours of cleaning, which was not without a few moments of excitement… like when I hoisted a hose over my shoulder and looked down to spot this plum-sized wolf spider (yes, VERY venomous) perched on one of the loops. Needless to say I dropped that hose and ran/jumped/screamed my way across the winery.

enemy #1

After that, I had to go back behind the fermenters to power wash them and the nastiness on the floors behind them. Thoroughly freaked out, my getup was meant to keep all creepy crawlies out.

anti-invasion of creepy crawlies

From the cleaning, we proceeded to the most incredible tasting experience I’ve ever had. We tasted at least 9 of Two Hands wines from the barrel, with Michael (the owner) and Matt (the winemaker) explaining why each wine tasted so exceptionally different from the next, whether it be the soil, the slope of a particular vineyard (factors known at the terroir), the additions they made pre- barrel aging, the barrels the wine was fermented in, etc… why hello, sensory and information overload.

Barrel tastes: Trent, Lindsey, Chelsea, Reed (a.k.a. Michael J. Fox), Tim, Michael (a.k.a. owner, expert spitter)

We then tasted 18 wines from the bottle, again with the explanation of why each wine varied.

Amazingness.

This tasting differed from all others I’ve done, and likely all others I will do outside of this circumstance, because we weren’t being spoken with by a sales rep, trying to peddle a wine he/she could likely care less about beyond next week’s paycheck. We were being educated and enlightened by two men whose livelihood depends on our appreciation and respect for their wines over the next several weeks. Pretty cool.

After that we headed to lunch at Vintners Bar & Grill, one of the best restaurants in the Barossa. Michael brought along these wines for us to enjoy with lunch. Including one of Chelsea’s family’s wines… A ’97 cab from Chateau Montalena… one of the best Napa vintages. Yummm.

More amazingness from Michael's personal cellar.

Since we had the afternoon off, we headed to Whistler’s cellar door, to taste through their wines with Sam, whose family owns Whistler, pouring for us. Sam’s mom has a soft spot for kangaroos, and has a little park set up next to the vineyard to provide a home for those who have been orphaned when their moms were hit by cars. This is their joey (baby roo), Buttons. I am in love.

Feeding Buttons almonds.

On Saturday, we headed to Adelaide to enjoy the Fringe Festival. A nearly month-long carnival, music and comedy fest that kicked off this weekend. We walked around the park where the fest is, rode some rides, had a delicious Indian dinner on Rundle Street, headed back to the fest for some more entertainment and then on to a bar for some dancing. Our fun night out was followed by a proper slumber party on Kate's (our housemate Nathan's gf) living room floor. What could be better for some team bonding?



dinner at Taj Tandoor



l-r: Erica, Reed, Pedro, Florent, Nathan, Lindsey, Tim, Chelsea, Random

hahaha

pillow fight, circa 7th grade