I have been putting off this post all day. Simply because I don't know where to start raving about it. I went and had dinner with Barbi on Friday night, which was lovely, and I was sensible and was home and in bed by 10pm. Much better than my normal form. I was up early and in the shower and got everyone organized. We were on the road by 7.50am. We dropped off the kids, and it took all my strength to be civil and polite and not bolt out of the place lol...... I was so excited I found it hard to stand still.
We headed off, stopped off and bought some fuel and some much needed coffee. Barbi's directions were spot on and we found the Holiday Inn without a hitch. The hardest part was getting from the foyer to our room. We were given a pass key, (like a credit card) which needed swiping before the elevator would go beyond a certain floor to our rooms. Dh in his eternal wisdom, (why I believed him I never know) said that the card probably told the lift what floor we were on. He also told me room 1410 was on the 15th floor!!!! I must have been in a good mood lol, to be conned twice......... Needless to say the card didn't tell the lift where to stop and all I managed to do was confuse the crap out of the poor lift. We rode around in a vertical kind of limbo for a few minutes when I decided I needed help!! The man at the desk must have thought we were insane........ Anyway he reswiped and re initiated our card and we were off again. This time to the 14th floor. I was rapt as it was only after 10am and we were able to check in much earlier than we thought. We dumped our stuff, freshened up and then headed out to the station, which is next door.
We rode one stop to Sth Brisbane and then took the long way to the Convention Centre. Actually in hindsight it probably wasn't the long cut, it just seemed that, because we didn't really know where we were going. The lobby into the Convention Centre is just huge. We headed straight to the area where Matt Moran's show was being held, so we only got a quick glance at what was on offer. We sat through the cooking show, which was good, but took quite a while. To put this comment into perspective, I thought we would have been leaving there by about 2pm. I thought we would see everything and would be ready to leave then.............. I couldn't have been more wrong.
We left the cooking demo and promptly found us some wine to taste. We bought ourselves some glasses, as after one tasting I decided I couldn't drink out of plastic for the entire day. As we warmed up the process, we just ambled from one stall to the next. Everywhere we went we were greeted with friendly, helpful and informative stall holders. I think they quickly surmised that we weren't just pissheads looking for a free drink,but that we were actually interested.
There was a huge mobile Wyndham Estate mobile van,
Wyndham Estate Bin 555 is my favourite reasonably priced shiraz. It's always good to buy when on special, so when we saw this huge truck, we knocked on the door to see what was on offer. When they said we could fit into the 4pm session, I thought that was pushing the envelope and that we might not be still around................
We even found the Yellow Tail stall, that's my favourite Chardonnay.............
We got quite tiddly, just having the best time, tasting, and talking to everyone....... I bought an apron, a bottle of wine from Bunnyconnellan, for obvious reasons, but also because it was as good as Yellow Tail Chardonnay. It was $20 a bottle, and I looked forward to drinking it on my birthday. We bought two six packs of beer we didn't want, because it came with a book and a t'shirt, I drank a 'lay back' because we bought the beer. We nearly bought a good coffee machine, but good sense and lack of funds prevailed - definitely something to look at down the track though. The brand was Rancilio and made the best coffee. We tasted a few dips and some nice gluten free bread, but the wine was unequivocally the highlight!!
We left the show, to 'The Good Food and Wine show is finished for today, please leave the building!'.
And I thought we would not stay there past 2pm!!
The session at the mobile cellar door was for shiraz and was informative and run by a vitner horticulturalist (he had a different name, but something like that). What a fabulous job!!
We came back to the hotel and then adjourned to the restaurant for dinner. The food was held up, as they lost our docket, which was great, because it was exorbitantly priced and we got dessert, coffee and free drinks. (I drank diet coke!!).
The next day we wanted to go to the museum, but we were both quite tired, even though we were in bed early. We walked through the Stanley St markets and just enjoyed being together, not rousing at anyone, not worrying about anyone, and just enjoying the different scenery and feeling like a couple again.........
We are going again next year, and are hoping to go for two nights! It's a day we will be talking about for a very long time.
