Vineyard Hopping

No hot water today: cold showers and cold breakfast.  Just partially kidding.  The shower went cold toward the end but while the soap was still covering the bod.  Alice, our cottage manager, responded promptly by coming over and switching the propane tanks.  They don’t have hot water tanks to store the heated water.  It’s directly heated from the propane.  Since we had to switch houses once and then have a cold shower, she compensated with a late check out on Saturday.

We struck out on our own today for bites at several vineyards not on our Friday tour.  At Alice’s suggestion we started at To Motu (think tomato) where we had an octopus small plate.  I had rose and Wayne had a Cabernet blend. Neither of us had the To Motu wines as a glass started at $45.  We had Dunleavy which started at $12.  And, as Wayne likes to say, “That’s New Zealand dollars!”.

Passage Rock Wine Glass Vine Sculpture

 Next stop was Passage Rock where we had pizza.  I had rose; Wayne had water.  The most interesting here were the sculptures formed from grape vines.  Also, they left some vine rows uncovered where we tasted the grape directly from the vine. Then, with no GPS service we worked our way to Man O’ War which sits on Man O’ War Bay.  This was the best of all. Not for the vineyard which we actually skipped, but for the drive past about 9 bays that just take your breath away.  My photos will not do justice to the blue and turquoise of the water, the vastness and depth of the space, or the land masses and islands. Nor will you see Wayne’s white knuckles as he drove through traveled, one lane, twisting roads.

With this drive today we have pretty much circumvented the Island and, along with Condé Nast rate it among the world’s top 20 islands.  See pictures of it at flickr.