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2008/6/29 
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Not being a fan of Mozart or Sound of Music, four nights in Salzburg seems a bit long. Actually, there were three full days, and we crossed the border for Germany on one of the days. Still, we seemed to have more time than we needed. There was only a few attractions that we really looked forward to see; there were actually more interesting attractions one hour driving away from the city (which is why Salzburg is a good starting point for travelling.) It might be a bit tourisy, but to be fair, Salzburg, especially the Old Town, is quite pretty, and I bet it's even more enjoyable in dry warm weather.
Our apartment in Salzburg is not too bad. The main reason we chose this, other than reasonable price, was that it could house 5 people (originally we had more people to travel together) The apartment was indeed big enough for more people, but there was only one bathroom (and its water pressure is a little low, plus draining is a little slow,) so I was glad we had only 3 people. The owner was quite nice, meeting us in person at the apartment, and showing us around in the neighborhood.
As for eating, most places were fine, with a couple restaurants more stand out. It probably has more to do with the fact that we wanted to spend less, after we had our fancy dinner in Munich. Here is the list of places we visited:
Carpe Diem Finest Fingerfood (International, reviewed in Frommers) - It might be finest, definitely expensive for something that can't really fill up the stomach (we thought this could be our dinner.) The fingerfood there is mainly the "cones", so instead of ice cream, it is appetizer type of food (like chicken wing and catfish) Everything is nice, so the main problem is the portion and relatively the price.
Ganshof Gasthaus (recommended by the apartment owner) - This is one of the few restaurants that is close to our apartment. It serves mainly local people; we can tell because most people there do not speak English. There was one serving us spoke a little English. It was really a pub, and the menu was small, but food was decent, and price was good as well. It was just a little smoky, but it's nice to have some local experience.
Mensa (University Canteen, reviewed in Lonely Planet) - Food is cheap and decent. It's mostly students there, and it gets a little smoky as well. University is in Old Town, so this place is in great location.
Wasserfall Restaurant (Italian, reviewed in Frommers) - I like this restaurant the best in Salzburg. It's not expensive, and food was great. The place itself is nice and comfortable. This place is in a busy business area, just across from the Old Town.
Zum Mohren (Austrian, reviewed in Frommers and Rick Steves) - It's weird that we ended up ordering mostly Italian stuff at this place; maybe the Austrian dishes were more expensive. The decor inside is a little offbeat with some strange paintings and sculpture; it's interesting nonetheless. It's located in the middle of Old Town.
Pizzeria Il Sole (Italian, reviewed in Frommers) - Near the elevator to the Museum of Modernity, this place is slightly under the street level. Both the food and price are fine, it's just the portion a little small.
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| 2008/6/25 
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About half hour driving from Salzburg, crossing the border to Germany, there is a big national park called Berchtesgaden. It is a popular place to visit for people based in Salzburg. The best thing about staying in Salzburg for 4 nights is that we can have a pretty flexible schedule. When we got to Salzburg, we found out the nice weather we have been enjoying was going to last for one more day in the coming week, so we went to the national park first. It was absolutely the right decision, we couldn't ask for a better day to visit Berchtesgaden; it's too bad we didn't get that nice weather for the rest of our trip.
Before the trip, I got whole bunch of books from public library, and I brought a few with me for the trip. One of them is about road trips in Germany, and it suggests a driving route in this Berchtesgaden area. The book is pretty good, except for the beginning part of the route, where it took us off the highway and leading us to some local traffic for some small town. So even though we started pretty early (shortly after 9am), we probably lost about an hour, trying to get back to the main route. By the time we got to our first stop, a lake called Hintersee, it was 11am.
Hintersee gave us a good introduction of what this area is like; a decent size lake with high mountains surrounding it. There is a couple of hotels or inns right by the lake, but in general it is not tourisy. It feels more like cottage country, with a quiet and calming feel to it. There are some hiking trails around the lake that leads to a town nearby, but of course we were only driving by this area.
The town nearby is called Ramsau. Apparently Vincent was quite looking forward to visit this town. He said he saw some nice pictures before the trip, and he knew what picture-taking spot to look for. I myself usually look at only a few pictures while preparing for a trip; maybe I want to save my first experience unspoiled. So my first experience of Ramsau: there is white mountains, clear water running with a bridge over it, a nice small church, bright blue sky, and green grass with some leaves turning colors. It looks better than my words can describe.
One of the Berchtesgaden's biggest attraction is the lake Konigssee, literally it means King's Lake (but they say it is not entirely correct.) There are two things most people do in Konigssee: one is to hike 20 minutes to a spot called Malerwinkel, literally Painters Corner; the other is to take a boat ride to a church called St. Bartholoma, which is on the shore, halfway down of this long lake. The view of the lake from the Painters Corner is great, even better with the leaves turning. The St. Bartholoma church is quite unique; I've never seen any church like that.
By the time we finished with Konigssee, it was well past 3pm. There was really enough time for one more stop, and it should've been Eagle's Nest (another popular attraction in the area), but I thought we could squeeze in a quick detour, driving on a scenic route on Rossfeld road. But in the end, we missed the last bus going up to Eagle's Nest. In fact, we thought we just made it, but we got on the wrong bus; we managed to get off the bus before it took us further down on the hill. Even though we didn't get to see the Eagle's Nest, I think we all felt it was a very good day of sightseeing.
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| 2008/6/24 
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As popular as Salzburg is as a tourist destination, I'm not sure if there was one attraction that I would call a must-see. Maybe the must-see thing there is the town itself, more precisely the Old Town, where Mozart used to roam around, or where they shot some of the scenes in the movie Sound of Music (although I think more scenes were shot outside of the city.) In a map provided by local tourism agency, they define a few different districts in the city. We spent most of our time in two of them: Cathedral District, and the Mozart District.
There are quite a few churches or cathedrals in the Old Town. We walked by most of them, went inside for a few of them; there is one called St. Peter's, its cemetery reminded me some scenes from Sound of Music.
Most memorable of them all is probably the Salzburg Cathedral. We got there late in the day, like just one hour before they close. So we were taking our time touring the place, then one clergy came to us and told us we should go to one particular room for a special exhibition they were having. He ended up being a little bit like our tour guide, guiding us different rooms, speeding up our tour a little bit. I think he wanted to secure the rooms for closing at the same time. At one point, he asked us where are we from. We told him we are from Toronto, and he just nodded. Wanted to keep conversation going, I added that we were all originally from Hong Kong, then he seemed to be more interested, and started telling us that he has been to Hong Kong, and how much he enjoyed the time there. I think from that point on, whenever someone ask us, we told them we are from Hong Kong; Toronto is not as good a conversation starter. Near the end of our tour of the place, the clergy bid us goodbye with some final words: "Remember, the world is good when the people is good." I don't know what Vincent and Naomi think of that, but to me, he seems to be saying, "and since we are all sinners, this world is in trouble". That is one gentle wise man.
While none of us are big fan of classical music, we managed to visit only one Mozart related attraction, the Mozart's Birthplace Museum. Although they call this the Mozart district, there are some other things to see (and there are not that many Mozart related things anyway.) We wanted to see the Residenz State Rooms, but they had it closed for some private functions; we did go one floor above where they have the Residenz gallery (not that interesting.)
As much as I like Salzburg (especially walking around in night time) I really wanted to enjoy the Old Town more. I think if the weather was better and warmer, we would spend time sitting in some outdoor cafe and relaxed a little. But it's been cold and wet most of the time, we forced ourselves to look for places to visit. We visited this brand new museum called Salzburg Museum. While everything there was new and nicely presented, it is more about the history of local people (other than Mozart), and it was just not that interesting to us. Maybe it's more interesting to local people.
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The Salzburg City Center is actually surrounded by hills, with a river running through it. One of the hills is supposed to be in a good defensive position, which is why they have this big Fortress sitting on top of it. As Salzburg literally means Salt Castle, salt (which was valuable back then) is what they stored in the fortress. Now it is a popular tourist attraction, with its entrance in the Old Town, offering Cable Car ride up to the fortress. Some of the things they display in the Fortress is kinda interesting; there is a small museum of Marionette (like puppets), and some exhibition on the history of Salzburg and the Fortress. But I was more interested in seeing the view of the city from here, even though it's been raining on and off the whole time.
To get a good view of the Fortress, on the other hand, we went to the the Mirabell Garden in city center. The garden is part of the Mirabell Palace, now a city administration office and library. The garden with fountains and the view of the fortress is a major attraction in itself. We didn't get to see the inside of the palace though.
Other than the hill where the Fortress is situated, there were other hills that offer good view of the city. One is just across the river from the Old Town, where we climbed some stairs to get to a church. There is a watchtower and some opening with a good view of the river and the Old Town. Another good viewpoint is where the Museum of Modernity located, on the north end of the Old Town. They run an elevator service from street level up to the museum. The view is not as good as the other two, but the museum is not bad. It happens that they have some kind of Chinese exhibition; their theme name is Mahjong, but we didn't see any Mahjong related.
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| 2008/6/23 
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Just outside of the city of Salzburg, there were a couple of places we visited. One is the Hellbrunn Palace, which is a popular attraction for the Sound of Music fans. All three of us watched the movie for the first time not long before the trip, but I think we only like the movie ok, so we weren't too excited about visiting Hellbrunn Palace. The most interesting thing there is the "trick" fountains (all operated by water pressure and mechanics), but I think the tour guide was having too much fun, trying to get us tourists wet by those hidden fountains. The palace and the garden is quite nice, but probably not as nice as the other ones we saw in the trip.
The other place just outside of Salzburg we visited is not really an attraction, but a fancy restaurant that I tried to persuade others to try. Even though we didn't have meals there, we went there anyway because the building where that restaurant located looks interesting. The building is called Hangar-7, owned by the company that makes Red Bull. It was actually a real hangar for the Salzburg airport, but they turned this into a museum/restaurant/bar entertainment complex. It looks pretty cool. And for that fancy restaurant, they flew in some celebrity chef every month. Too bad that for the month we were there, we weren't too interested in the chef's menu.
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After spending a few days in Salzburg, we continued our road trip, and headed to Hallstatt, one of the most picturesque town in Austria. Chances are, you have seen a picture of it before knowing the name of the place (which is exactly the case for Naomi; she has a jigsaw puzzle of Hallstatt before learning about it for the trip.) It is not far from Salzburg, and it is kinda on the way to Vienna; we just had to drive thru some mountain roads.
We should have known what mountain roads could mean; even lower temperature, icy, and snow. Well, there were some snow showers even in Salzburg, but by the time we get to the mountain area, we saw more snow on the ground already. We planned a stop before Hallstatt, a lake called Gosausee (near the town Gosau) We almost didn't make it there, because the road was steep and slippery. In fact we had already gave up and headed back (our tires were not snow tires, and it was slipping bad) Then we saw a snowplow truck passing by. With the road cleared a bit, we tried again, and we managed to get thru that steep stretch, and got to the lake. We saw the lake alright, but it was pretty much white out, nothing like we saw in pictures before the trip. Then when we headed back down that same road, it was even more dangerous. I was not thrill driving there.
With that little adventure, we didn't get to Hallstatt until early afternoon (I was hoping to get there a little earlier.) But then with less than ideal weather, we didn't need a lot of time to see Hallstatt. There were snow everywhere, it was definitely not as picturesque, and we could hardly see the mountains. We walked around a little, it has a nice little square in the middle, and we found the spot where everyone takes pictures of the town. But it was very quiet, with only a handful of people around.
Our apartment in Hallstatt was not bad, but it was almost like a homestay because our hosts live just upstairs. The apartment is really split up into two rooms; one bedroom and one living room with a hallway divided up in between. The toilet is outside of the two rooms, and the shower stall is in the bedroom (I think it used to be a closet.) Even though the setup is a little strange, we really have no complains; everything is clean and works properly. And it has a great view of the town and the lake. We wish we could stay there a little longer than just one night; we could only afford one afternoon to relax in Hallstatt, even in bad weather.
MSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=107
| 2008/6/22 
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When we were planning for the trip, knowing that we would be going to Prague, I suggested going to Auschwitz in Poland, to visit the concentration camp there. But we didn't feel comfortable enough to visit two countries in East Europe, so we dropped the idea. But we managed to include a visit to a concentration camp when we were planning for Austria.
It was not exactly fun to visit the Mauthausen Concentration Camp; it was the first time visiting such a place for all of us. I think we all understand we need to be respectful, not to be loud, and definitely not to be cheery or crack a smile. It was certainly an unique and learning experience. We ended up spending more than two hours there; we could've spent more time there, but we got a schedule to keep, other places to visit, before getting to Vienna.
Speaking of schedule, it was extremely tight. Originally we planned to leave Hallstatt (where we spent the night before) early in the morning, to go to the Mauthausen Concentration Camp, and then to finish our visit there around 11am. Well, we didn't leave as early as we planned, and didn't get to Mauthausen until 11am. I figured we'll know what to skip when the time comes.
I actually thought we would skipped the next stop, the Melk Abbey. My understanding was that Melk Abbey is a great looking building overseeing the Danube river, and so I was hoping to take pictures from the outside. By the time we got there, it was raining pretty hard, so I didn't think I want to stick around. But Vincent thought we could have lunch in the town, and see what to do after. So we went to a decent place for lunch (Tom's Restaurant listed in Lonely Planet.) By the time we finished lunch, it was almost 4pm, just barely made it to the last admission to Melk Abbey. Was I glad we didn't skip this place, its Marble Hall, the Library, and the Baroque abbey itself, all are very impressive. And of course the weather became a little better by then, so I got a few shots of the building as well.
After Mauthausen and Melk, I felt we've had a good day of travelling already, so I wasn't so concerned about rest of the day, as long as we get to Vienna in the end. Well, I was actually quite looking forward to this next stop even before the trip; it was to visit a winery in Austria's Wachau wine region. We had contacted one winery in advanced, but by the time we got there (which was quite late), there were no one answering the door. So the only thing left to do is to sneak into their vineyard, which is just behind their houses, hoping to get caught. So after taking a few pictures there, we continued our road trip. The plan was to have dinner at the next stop, a town called Krems. There is a nice little town center area where the shops and restaurants are. We walked around a little, but we decided it is better to get to Vienna as soon as possible; it would be difficult to sort things out late at night if there was any complications with our Vienna apartment. The apartment was fine, although it took us a bit of time to find it; a correct address would have certainly helped.
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Vienna was a little disappointing to us, mostly because of the weather (it was pretty much wet the whole time we were there.) Maybe in the back of our mind, we wish to have some classical music soundtrack to accompany us in Vienna, but we didn't even see any street performers (kinda hard with wet weather.) And because it was low season, many things were closed or in maintenance. Even though there were less tourists, I think a little more people around would make the city a little more lively.
The apartment we got in Vienna was quite good; everything was clean and nicely furnished (Ikea stuff can't go wrong) It's good that Vincent found this place, because I wouldn't be able to come up with this place, not without much reviews online. (Although now I found their website: http://www.wienappartements.at )
If weather kept us down for sightseeing, I think we did relatively well in terms of eating. It probably has more to do with the fact that we weren't planning to spend big for meals in Vienna. I didn't expect much, so the places we visited didn't have to do much meet or exceed my expectation. And of course the cafe there has great chocolate cakes (oh, that's right, we were planning to have dessert all the time, instead of real meals)
Here is the list of places we visited for lunch and dinner:
Soho (Canteen, reviewed in Lonely Planet) - well hidden in the Hofburg Imperial Palace, I think it's meant for locals. Food is not bad (but nothing fancy), and it's quite cheap.
Toko Ri (Japanese, reviewed in LP) - local Japanese chain that is probably run by Chinese (some waiter speaks Mandarin.) Their raw fish seems fine, and the Bento box is pretty good value (relative to other food you get there)
Cafe Leopold (International, reviewed in Frommers and LP) - located inside the Leopold Museum. Inexpensive and very good looking place. Food is quite good as well (it has some Asian fusion stuff) I think it is more like a bar late at night.
Cafe Demel (Cafe, reviewed in Frommers and LP) - one of many cafes we could have tried in City Center. This one does not disappoint, Hot Chocolate and chocolate cake was excellent.
Chang's Asian Noodles (Asian, reviewed in LP) - not exactly in tourist area, and it probably caters to local workers. The noodles was not bad, and not expensive (again relatively speaking). Decor is the standard Chinese modern style (can I call it Chinese 2.0 style?)
Plutzer Brau (Pub, reviewed in Frommers and LP) - Standard pub food with nice decor and quite a bit of people. Food was decent and inexpensive. Beer was pretty good.
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| 2008/6/21 
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Vienna has plenty of museums, palaces, and museums that used to be palaces. There are quite a few museums close to the Imperial Palace in City Center; three of them are actually side-by-side in a complex called Museum Quarter. We visited two out of the three; one is called Leopold Museum, with some works by the famous Austrian Gustav Klimt (so the art there is kinda modern) We also visited MUMOK, which is even more "modern", with some works that I can't tell if it is really art. At least the building itself looks interesting.
Southwest of the city center, we went to the Schonbrunn Palace by subway. This Palace is even more grand than the Imperial Palace. Too bad that they do not allow picture taking. So all I have is a few postcards to remind myself how beautiful the Grand Gallery is (or by visiting this site: http://austria-360.at/wien/page-grossegalerie.html) I did get to take pictures of the gardens behind the palace. The area for the gardens is just huge, with all those fountains, pools, and buildings. And even though it was in off season, the gardens were still in pretty good shape.
A little bit closer, south of city center, there is the Belvedere Palace, where the Austrian Gallery Belvedere is housed. They have some of the most famous works by Gustav Klimt, so I felt this is one of the must-do in Vienna. (Although Vincent wasn't that impressed by Klimt's The Kiss) Like the Schonbrunn Palace we visited, there is a nice garden between the two main buildings of Belvedere Palace.
MSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=104 | 2008/6/20
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It is interesting that, unlike other cities in this trip, we found quite a bit to do during evening/night time in Vienna. Top on the list was to watch a show in the opera house. We actually went there twice (because first time we were quite late, even for last minute walk-in). It was definitely a nice experience, to see an opera in Vienna (so cultural!) We also went to a historical Ferris Wheel, not far from our apartment. It is totally a tourist trap (and kinda a rip-off), but it was something interesting to do.
I also reserved some evening time to visit Rathaus, the City Hall. I wanted to take some pictures of the building with lights on, probably because I saw some of Kelvin's pictures and also some in guidebooks. I know Vienna has such long history and all, but I just can't believe how great their City Hall looks, putting Toronto City Hall in shame.
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St. Stephan's Cathedral and the Imperial Palace are the two major attractions in Vienna city center. The Cathedral itself was not that memorable, although it does offer a good view of the city from the top of its tower. The business area between the Cathedral and the Palace is more interesting, having shops and restaurants mixing in mostly historic buildings.
On the other hand, Hofburg offers quite a few things to see. The Imperial Apartments have displays on stories and history of the emperor Franz Joseph (supposedly a good hardworking emperor); the Sissi Museum has some more interesting stories about empress Sissi (we were so interested that we actually took our time to read most of the displays); and the Imperial Treasury (some impressive crown jewels)
One problem with visiting the Hofburg is that they have separate admission to different buildings in the palace. So even though I had put down the National Library and the Spanish Riding School in our plan, we ended up not seeing them (save money, save time). Another disappointing thing is that most places there do not allow photo taking, so I don't have a lot of pictures of what we saw.
MSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=102 | 2008/6/19
A friend thinks I am crazy, going on a road trip with a couple of people whom I barely knew. But if there is one thing me and my two American friends have in common, it is to see as much Europe as we can while being in another continent. The drive from Holland to Berlin was smooth, if uneventful. It was very much like any road trip in North America, with service stations opening into the night. It was about 7 or 8 hours ride, and by the time we got to our hotels, it was midnight already.
Day One:
Berlin - Tiergarten, Brandenburg Gate, Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, Gendarmenmarkt, Museum Island, Sony Center
9:30am Walking across Tiergarten
Bright, early, and cold, we probably made the mistake of walking from hotel to Reichstag through Tiergarten. It was pretty much freezing, and there wasn't much to see in this big park. And of course worst of all, it took us an hour to walk when we were already short in time.
10:30am Road to Brandenburg Gate
The only image I had for Berlin before this trip was the Brandenburg Gate from MTV for an U2 song. I distinctly remember the long empty road leading to the Gate from the West Berlin side. So I enjoyed being on there quite a bit.
11:00am Reichstag's Cupola
Reichstag's Cupola (or Dome of the German Parliament building) has to be the coolest thing I saw in Berlin. This attraction is probably on the top of most travel guidebook lists, so I know I have seen the must-see of this trip. I do wish we had more time for the parliament area; there seems to be more interesting buildings close by.
11:30am Coffee Break
From the time we left our hotels, going through the Tiergarten, visiting the Reichstag's Cupola, we had been outside the whole time, so we really needed to warm ourselves up. We went to some cafe close to the Reichstag for something hot to drink. On our way we saw these street performers doing this life-size puppet. Bob originally thought they were doing some kind of political protest, until they started asking for money. I have to say that was kinda neat.
12:30pm Brandenburg Gate
I'm a little unclear on how the East and West Berlin was divided. If I'm not mistaken, behind this Gate is where West Berlin ended. One interesting note from a travel guidebook, the hotel behind this Gate, is where Michael Jackson made the news, holding his baby in the air beyond his balcony. I suppose people were concerned that he might drop the baby.
3:00pm Checkpoint Charlie
You can probably call this a tourist trap; this is supposedly one of the checkpoints going from one side to the other. However there is really not that much to see. We did stop at some busy area, with lots of shopping and interesting malls.
3:30pm Gendarmenmarkt
Gendarmenmarkt is a square with three nice buildings: Concert Hall, French Cathedral, and German Cathedral. It was getting late, and we were running out of time, so we didn't have a chance to see the inside of these buildings.
4:00pm Museum Island
This is part of Berlin where their museums are located. There should be a couple interesting museums, but we really had no plan for them; we were just walking in this area. In fact, we have been walking all day. While all of this were not that far from the hotel, it was freezing cold. We finally had enough walking, and hailed a cab to take us to another shopping/entertainment area.
4:30pm Sony Center
We could see this Dome shape from the Tiergarten in the morning. There is actually not much shopping, mostly restaurants and a big movie theatre. We had some afternoon tea at one place there, and then headed to a pub for some beer after. It was late enough for most places closing, but not quite the time for dinner.
9:30pm Near Hotel (West Berlin)
Our hotel is really in the West Berlin area, close to the center of West Berlin. Buildings seem to be a little older, as more new developments were closer to East Berlin. The Sculpture Berlin is the most interesting thing I saw in that area.
Day Two:
Sachsenhausen National Memorial
We spent two nights in Berlin, but we really spent only one day there. The drive back to Holland is about 8 hours, so we didn't have much time on the second day. We did plan a little side trip to Sachsenhausen concentration camp, just outside of Berlin, before driving back. It has a unique East German feel to it. You can never say it is fun to visit a concentration camp, but it's certainly worth a visit, even though it gives me chill to be standing on the ground where people died; this is exactly the purpose of the memorial.
MSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=101 2008/6/18 www.flickr.com
GINI 18 was taken place on June 15, 2008 (yes, Father's Day) So there were a few fathers among us choose to spend that evening having wine with us. As mentioned in my previous post, I missed GINI 17, so I think Andrew and Vincent are the only ones who have been to all tastings.
Our theme this time is Australian Cabernets Blends; so all the wine we tried this time have Cabernet Sauvignon blended with other grapes.
Here are the wines we had:
- Coriole Mary Kathleen Cabernet Merlot 2000 (90% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot)
- Lindemans Pyrus 1999 (61% Cabernet Sauvignon, 31% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Franc)
- Lindemans Limestone Ridge 1999 (71% Shiraz , 29% Cabernet Sauvignon)
- Primo Estate Joseph Moda Amarone Cabernet Merlot 1999 (90% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot)
Most interesting of all is the Primo Estate Joseph, which is done in "Moda Amarone" style, meaning the grapes are let to dry fo couple weeks before crushing. This method is originating from Valpolicella near lake Garda in northern Italy, and the final result is a very ripe, raisiny, big-bodied wine with very little acid (a little like Port)
Andrew and Vincent W will have their tasting notes of the wine in the blog SeaTourist blog . Following is the voting results for our favorite in this tasting.
The GINI Australian Cab Blend Index
We ranked the bottles 1 to 4, add up the numbers, whichever one has the lowest score is the best. Although a lot of people were present, only a few participate the rating. Here is the list of participants: Aaron, Andrew, Jim, Kwong C, Kwong T, and Vincent W.
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Bottle #
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Vineyard
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Region
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Pts
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Group Rank
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My Rank
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1
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Coriole Mary Kathleen Cabernet Merlot 2000
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McLaren Vale, Australia
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14
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2
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4
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2
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Lindemans Pyrus 1999
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Coonawarra, Australia
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12
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1
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3
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3
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Lindemans Limestone Ridge 1999
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Coonawarra, Australia
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15
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3
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1
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4
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Primo Estate Joseph Moda Amarone Cabernet Merlot 1999
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McLaren Vale and Coonawarra, Australia
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24
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4
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2 |
MSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=100 2008/6/17 www.flickr.com
We had our GINI 16 back in Dec. 8, 2007. (And I'm blogging half year later, now how's that possible?) I suppose many things were happening; there was GINI 17 (and I missed it), and there was Vegas and Napa (so quite a bit of wine already) So now in June 2008, we are having GINI 18.
Our theme this time is the two Spanish Rs, Rioja and Ribera del Duero. Vincent W have this for introduction of them:
Rioja - A leading wine region in Spain. Main red varitals: Tempranillo, Garnacha, Mazuelo, Graciano
Ribera Del Duero - An up and coming region that challenges the importance of Rioja. Main red varital is Tempranillo, although Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Malbec are also allowed.
Here are the wines we had:
- Muga Rioja Reserva Selection Especial 1995
- Muga Rioja Reserva Selection Especial 1998
- Bodegas Alejandro Fernandez Tinto Pesquera Crianza Ribera Del Duero 2001
- Flor de Pingus Ribera Del Duero 2003
According to Vincent W, the bottling 'Reserva Selection Especial' for Muga is made in better years with longer aging in oak barrels than their normal Reserva. Also, Flor de Pingus is the 2nd wine of the expensive "cult" wine Pingus, which is 20 times more expensive than the one we are having.
Andrew and Vincent W have their tasting notes of the wine in the blog SeaTourist blog (see December 12th, 2007). Following is the voting results for our favorite in this tasting.
The GINI Spanish R&R Index
We ranked the bottles 1 to 4, add up the numbers, whichever one has the lowest score is the best. Here is the list of participants: Aaron, Andrew, Kwong C, Kwong T, Naomi, Stephanie, Vincent M, Vincent W and his parents.
|
Bottle #
|
Vineyard
|
Region
|
Pts
|
Group Rank
|
My Rank
|
|
1
|
Muga Rioja Reserva Selection Especial 1995
|
Rioja, Spain
|
24
|
2
|
1
|
|
2
|
Muga Rioja Reserva Selection Especial 1998
|
Rioja, Spain
|
18
|
1
|
2
|
|
3
|
Bodegas Alejandro Fernandez Tinto Pesquera Crianza Ribera Del Duero 2001
|
Ribera Del Duero, Spain
|
21
|
4
|
4
|
|
4
|
Flor de Pingus Ribera Del Duero 2003
|
Ribera Del Duero, Spain
|
24
|
3
|
3 |
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