Posts Tagged ‘wine’

We left Luxembourg in the morning and had a rather slow train ride to Strasbourg, in France.  I’m not sure if there was something wrong with the train, but about every 20 minutes we would stop for five or ten minutes before continuing on.  And not at a station either, just in the middle of nowhere.  Still, it was pretty countryside and we were not in too much of a hurry.

Once we got to Strasbourg it about noon and we headed straight to the information desk in the train station.  They were very helpful and explained how to get the tram to the hotel we had booked, and what the best transportation options are.  Strasbourg has a really good tram system that runs at most hours of the day and it is possible to get a ticket (for about 5 Euros) that lets up to three people travel on the trams as much as they want for 24 hours.  This was so, so good.  We were able to see so much of the city and had no problems at all getting around.

Our hotel was called Cerise Hotel and was a big success.  Inexpensive, really clean, internet in the rooms (important because we still had a lot of planning we needed to do) and even had a fridge and microwave in the room so that you could eat in a bit.  We took pretty full advantage of that!

Our plan was to do a few hours of planning and work on updating the (very out of date) blog and then to get out and see something of the city in the evening.  Despite having a small setback with our internet not working, the hotel sent someone up immediately to fix it, and we were able to get a few days of plans finalized.  This calmed us down substantially and as we set out to see the city we were feeling so happy and positive!

We took the tram to the central area and then walked around taking it in.

Canal and "Petite France"

(more…)

Hazel decided that for my birthday she would get me a nice night out in Spain – complete with Flamenco Dancing!  This has been something I’ve been really into since I saw a show in Ithaca back in 2005.  So I was stoked!  It turned out to be the perfect evening.  We started out the night at the restaurant “El Buey” – a favorite Hazel found on SpottedByLocals.com, a site that’s half TripAdvisor and half blog with entries by locals from the area.  We love this site!  Anyway, back to our date.  The specialty of the house is cook-it-yourself OX!  They bring 1kg of ox tenderloin sliced thinly (along with patatas fritas of course) and ceramic plates heated to a really high temperature.  Meat goes on plate, and voila!

El Buey

(more…)

Dr. DeWitt the veterinarian!

We had a very fun and joyful stop in Ithaca, NY to watch Justin’s sister Jessica graduate from veterinary school at Cornell University.  It’s good to have a doctor in the family!

(more…)

We headed south from Los Vilos, past Santiago, to the city of San Fernando for the 2011 Fiesta de la Vendmia.  This was the second year this festival occurred and it showcases wines from the Colchagua Valley, which is considered one of the best wine regions in Chile.  We had a blast!

We stayed for two nights in the town at the Hotel España, which was a slightly bizarre place, but not in a bad way.  Half of the interior of the hotel was filled with giant plants and greek looking statues like a strange indoor mini-plaza.  It was a bit shabby, but a nice place to stay and an easy walk from the square with the wine festival.

The festival itself was really well put together and the wine was absolutely awesome.  There were booths all around the main square with the wineries in the middle and all kinds of delicious bbq and ceviche and other tasty foods around the outside.  There were even booths from a couple of local breweries.  The bbq was done over large piles of coals and whole animals were cooked at a time – pork and lamb.  The air smelled like delicious roasting meat, wood smoke and red wine!

  (more…)

Well it has been a long time since I talked about the various libations that Hazel and I have tried.  Having been to both Argentina and Chile since we left New Zealand, we’ve gained even more of a perspective on how people around the world consume their beer.   Turns out that the pacific coast of the US has a different opinion about beer than most other places in the world!  (Sorry East Coast, Yuengling just doesn’t cut it anymore :) )

In Argentina, we had the realization that there just isn’t much in the way of beer.  The two main players throughout the country were Quilmes, a very light lager whose primary characteristic was that a liter cost US$1.50.  The other choice was Brahma, which costs less than Quilmes.  Neither had much going for them other than that they are cheaper than water around there.  I did enjoy the occasional Brahma (my preferred of the two) but the most interesting beers were found while we travelled around Patagonia.  We went to three Patagonian towns: Ushuaia, El Calafate, and El Chaltén (We also traveled to Chile’s Puerto Natales, but I’m saving that for another post).

(more…)

Well, you asked for it — some photos of our new apartment! Here you go:

[smugmug url=”http://justinandhazel.smugmug.com/hack/feed.mg?Type=gallery&Data=15682096_TsWiv&format=rss200″ title=”Apartamento” description=”Photos%20of%20our%20lovely%20new%20studio%21″ imagecount=”5″ start=”1″ num=”5″ thumbsize=”Th” link=”smugmug-lightbox” captions=”false” sort=”true” window=”false” smugmug=”false” size=”M”]

Not a bad place! It includes amenities like satellite TV (Los Simpson is a pretty good show to watch), air conditioning (!!!!!! muy importante!), and an easy walk to all sorts of public transportation. Second floor means it’s reasonably cool and not a long lift ride, and the neighborhood is not too shabby!

Buenos Aires the town is a lot more manageable when you have a space to yourself. Instead of going into a locker for your stuff, worrying about leaving food around, worrying about other people snoring, etc, you can have a nice relaxing evening after a long afternoon in school studying Spanish. Being relaxed allows us to enjoy some of the details of the town, like how there are little shops everywhere, selling fresh fruit! We made a ton of OJ out of 2 kilograms of oranges that we bought for a whopping 7 pesos (that’s $1.75 for those listening at home). Super sweet and delicious! Other interesting bits are the dogs lying around everywhere, busy following or imitating their owners, the way that little cafes and restaurants pop up in the strangest places, and the super cheap food. ¡Bueno!

Last night we had an amazing date at the parrilla (grill) at which we sampled some beautiful food and drink. For our wine we had a Malbec “Alamos”, which was really quite a delicious drink. I think it may be available in the US as well! For the “plata principal” Hazel had “Bife de Lomo”, an enormous Sirloin steak, cooked as the Argentines like it — “a punto”, which means medium-well in US steak terms. It’s a bit of a change, but the flavor of the Sirloin really comes out when the steaks are cooked to that doneness. I had pork chops ‘a la riojan’, which means that one chop had an egg on it and the other had ham and red peppers. This came with potatoes and peas. Along with a side of steamed chard we were in heaven! That was before dessert which was just a sugar overload. We decided to have the homemade chocolate mousse (Delicious) and a side of dulce de leche, which was almost too much!

Favorite NZ beer so far - in Christchurch

 The next day we continued up the coast and stopped in at Kaikoura – known for its whale watching and sea life.  We didn’t go out on a boat, but we did go on a hike that was full of seals and birds.  There was a Red-Eyed Gull breeding colony along the way and birds just everywhere.  The beach there was pretty unique too.  Really unusual rocks.

Birds

Beach walk at Kaikoura

Baby gull

Really crazy rocks

More birds

 On our way back through town after the hike we noticed a wine bar, so we checked that out.  It had something I’d never seen before, but Justin had in Italy – wine dispensing machines.  They would give you either a small taste, a half glass, or a full glass and just keep track of the prices of what you drank so you could pay at the end.  Pretty nifty!

Cool wine dispenser