10th-12th April 2009: Martinborough

Having scooped my prospective parents-in-law off the ferry, we set off to conquer the wine regions of the North Island. We started at Martinborough, north-east of Wellington, and stayed in the charming and comfortable Martinborough Hotel.

Martinborough is unusual in that most of the wineries are small and close together. This makes cycling an ideal way to get around them, allowing for a long day of tasting and a wobble home afterwards. Luckily for our livers (and the drivers of Martinborough) we were only able to get bikes for the morning.

Ian, making good use of the bike's drink holder

We visited Martinborough Vineyard, Winslow Wines, Ata Rangi, and Benfield & Delamere. Winslow was the most memorable, both for its excellent wines and the interesting but long-winded discourse from the owner on matching wines to food; it took an hour and a half to taste four wines. Ata Rangi is the source of the delicious Pinot Noir given to Tim by Nishan, but we weren't allowed to taste it that day.

We finished up with a late lunch at the Alana winery. Winery restaurants always seem to have good food and great settings. By the end of lunch we were fit for nothing more than a snooze before dinner.

The next day we set out for Hawkes Bay, but stopped on the way for a short walk in Holdsworth. We battled up a steep track to a viewpoint with great views of Mount Holdsworth and the surrounding hills. By all accounts the walking at the south end of the North Island is great - shame it's such a long drive from Auckland.