#82- Grillo

I hate writing about wines that don't have websites. It appears this one did exist at some point but no longer exists. How can a winery in this day and age not have a website? Perhaps there's a new venture there waiting. But I probably have to learn Italian first.

But back to the wine and our camping adventure and drinking 5 Italian wines. This day was a beautiful and perfect day for a nice relaxing walk. Craig and I loaded up our backpacks with sandwiches and wine and headed out and down the Columbia Icefields Parkway to the Athabasca Falls parking lot. It was jammed pack. Parking to be found nowhere. We watched cars go in circles desperate for a spot. We were in that same circle and chose to try the middle lane up the circle instead of being sheep and lo and behold a nice parking spot was waiting for us.

This was Owen's first time at the Falls and being the Aunt and Uncle in this situation, Craig and I were overly prepared in our pep safety talk that morning. Owen is a typical 5 year old- curious, agile and prone to running when given the opportunity. He is also safe, thoughtful when it comes to risky situations and a good listener. We tried to prepare him for the Falls and what he'd see and the dangers that accompany such a wonder. In case you've never been to the Falls (it was Craig's first time too), here is a link to Parks Canada and the Wikipedia entry . Here's also a great Youtube video. I just checked out the official website and it's terrible, almost embarrassing. I really do to make a living making websites. Wait a second....

Anyway, Owen behaved very well and only once tried to climb the fence for a better view but he only got about 0.75 inches off the ground before Craig was grabbing him.

We had a great time walking around the Falls and Owen walked when asked and the point was driven home as we descended the rock staircase to the bottom and witnessed a little girl barreling up the stairs, and not paying attention smacking her head on overhanging rocks at full speed. The crack was deafening. I immediately went over to her aid. Her parents sauntered over, not even bothering to say thanks. I'm guessing she's okay but it still drives the point home that children need to be supervised.

As we headed to the bottom, Owen was hellbent then on being the best behaved 5 year old there and reminded us every few seconds that he indeed was. We threw rocks in the lake and he and Craig built their very own Inukshuk. Very Canadian I'd say.

And then it was off to walk a bit further down the river to a large boulder and surrounding rocks. A perfect spot for our picnic lunch. We whipped out our sandwiches and wine.

The wine is a Noi Negociants Grillo wine from Italy. It is a white wine. The Grillo grape does not appear on the Wine Varietal table. It's also known as the riddu grape and grown in the Sicily. It's often used in Marsala wine which most of us have heard about. It also has a few other names it goes under but Grillo is one of the easier names to remember. Normally Italian wines don't put the name of the grape on the label but this one did (and so nice when you're hunting for varietals).

Of course this is camping and camping means simple foods. Just like the day before, we had packed out sandwiches. This this time it was a nice turkey sandwich on white. A touch of mustard and a handful of nuts and I was in my glory drinking wine, eating sandwiches and looking out at spectacular views of the most beautiful backyard someone could ask for.

Both Craig and I enjoyed this wine and it didn't take us long to nearly finish the bottle back at camp. It was chilled from the night before. The wine is very yellow and it quite minerally. A bit on the sweet side (makes sense with the Marsala connection) and smells grassy. Some say hay. Pick up a bottle and you can decide for yourself. As with the other white wines we've been drinking all weekend, I liked this wine as well and would definitely pick it up again.

I'm thinking upon review that it's time to go on a shopping spree and go and get myself some more Italian wines. But why shop here- back to the source! Wine trip anyone?

#70- Inzolia

Another day of camping, another day of drinking wine.

After a great day of hiking 8 km roundtrip in bear country, we were ready for some wine.

But I do have to mention that I had a great time hiking with my parents. I know that they sometimes think they're too slow and hold me up on hikes but one thing I learned from the Everest trek is that the hike is about the journey, not the finish line. I had a great time with them, with or without the bears. In fact, we didn't see any wildlife at all on the hike.

So back at the campsite, we started up our fire and started to prep the food for dinner. Now remember, we're cooking over open flame so the simpler the better. This evening's food du jour- hamburgers! And the hamburgers were delicious! We piled on the vegetables between the nicely toasted buns and dug in. Now I suppose I should have had a red wine with this meal but I had two whites so white wine it was.

The wine we had is the Contempo Inzolia from Sicily, Italy. The Contempo name means "at the same time" and is supposed to represent the winery's past to future- or something like that. The winery is the Abbazia Santa Anastasia Winery (note to the winery- your site takes way too long to upload). I'd like to talk a little more about the winery but it's all in Italian and their English site is not up yet. But I do like the violin music (er...)

The Inzolia wine is a very fragrant grape and was a very easy wine to drink. At first, I didn't like this wine at all but it did grow on me as the night grew on and the wine settled a bit. Even in the silver tumblers, the bright yellow colour of the wine was unmistakable. I'd have to say though I was pretty neutral on it as it was very reminiscent of the other white wine I had just tried- the tocai fruilano. It's not a wine I'd go out of my way to go and buy but if I was offered another glass of it, I wouldn't pass it up.

The Inzolia grape is also known as the Ansonica grape (sounds dangerous).There's not much else to tell you except that I'd recommend you go and try the Inzolia grape yourself. Craig is going a big wine catch up this weekend so I'll actually  be able to give you his opinions. By the way, mom liked it...

#27- Catarratto

It was the yellowest wine we'd seen in a while. Now one could perhaps blame the silver goblets we were drinking the wine from but no, it was freaking urine yellow. Craig really liked the wine. I thought it was so so. Split decision. I could end this blog right here, right now. But I won't.

There is just so much more to tell!! The grape we were trying on our first day, first hike was the Catarratto wine from Sicily, a product of Italy. Bought for $15.99 at Crown Liquor in Spruce Grove, the wine was chilled prior to Craig and I heading up on our first hike at Mt. Robson Provincial Park in British Columbia. More on the hike later.

The winery is from Terre di Ginestra in Italy (and as far as I can find, no website for the winery- please let me know if this is not the case). It's also cheap wine and I can tell by the label. On the label itself it says "Indicazione Geografica Tipica" or IGT which in layman's terms means less than, or cheap wine. Well $15.99 is cheap here but would be one hell of a bottle in Italy me thinks! Well, I'll let you know whether the latter part is true when I'm in Italy in just a couple of weeks!  But again, more of that later- say Wednesday.

My first thought about this wine was that it tasted exactly like apple juice. It looked like it, it smelled like it, it had the consistency of it. It reminded me of no other wine I had tasted in recent memory, perhaps the closest being the Vermentino wine. I was pretty neutral on it but Craig really seemed to enjoy it. I blame the fact that he was sick as anything and couldn't taste much.

We drank this wine after a pleasant 7km hike from the Mt. Robson Visitor Centre (at the base of Mt. Robson, the tallest mountain in the Canadian Rockies. Part of a larger hike to Berg Lake, Craig and I had left mid afternoon for the hike so we only (and planned) to make it to Kinney Lake. Berg Lake is a two day hike up the mountain and some climbers choose to stay at Kinney Lake as a pit stop. We pitstopped.

I ate chocolate and beef jerky with my wine. What can I say? I was hiking people!! I was not about to bring anything much more than that. I was busy trying out my new pack (love it) and my new trekking poles (love them!). Eating wasn't something we'd really thought about for the afternoon as we were in between meals.

Craig and I rested for a bit, drank our wine and observed that our hike was telling us to drink. On the mountain across the lake, the trees were growing in the shape of an upside down wine glass! So we took our pics, got our sugars up and headed back down the mountain. We hit a bit of rain on the way down but overall this was a very pleasant hike.