Vancouver International Wine Festival

I have been slack. Really, really slack. I'm going to blame it on work being crazy busy (partially true), but I have managed to keep up to date with the Real Housewives of Melbourne and Facebook... So really I've just been slack. Sorry! I'm going to take you back to the first weekend in March. Yes, that long ago...

There has been a bit of a theme since coming to Canada, we're pretty good at going to wine festivals. It could possibly count as our super power. Since being here we've gone to 4 wine festivals, all with a fairly similar outcome.

While all the others were all Canadian wines, this one had wines from all over the world. Including Australia. Unfortunately the wines from Australia left a lot to be desired. Yellow and Pink were on the menu, which was disappointing. As we've drunk a lot of Canadian wine, we focused our attention on French and Argentinian wines. In particular, the ones we couldn't afford. 

To start with, we drank champagne (or French champagne as they like to say on the Real Housewives of Melbourne). As we went to the Saturday afternoon session, it wasn't overly busy and we were able to hit the booths as fast as we liked. We tried some delicious champagnes, and I'm hoping they were of higher quality than Pink and Yellow. As the prices were often over $100, I suspect they are a little fancier. The aim of the afternoon was to drink enough champagne that it covered our $65 ticket. The result? Great success.

After focusing on bubbles for a while, we moved to the Bordeaux and Rhône reds. After a few glasses our power of words was failing us. In an effort to tell the young French man serving us from one winery that I liked reds with a bit of tannins (robust?!), Alexis told him I liked "strong" wines. He took that to mean I am a huge derro, and poured me the cheapest, shittiest stuff. After I poured it out, I turned to Lex and said "I think I'm being judged." She laughed, but when we turned back to him and I said I didn't like it, he turned the bottle over, showed me the alcohol contest and said "but it's very strong?!" The shame!

We moved on from French wine after that. Too much judging. We tried some from Argentina, they must have been good as we bought a few bottles. There were also tastings from the USA and Chile. It was a great afternoon and we followed it up with a delish dinner and cocktails from L'Abatoir, and a hangover driving home the next day. 

A Christmas Preparation Weekend

Christmas preparation has began at the O'Hara household! Last year we were out on the east side for the few weeks before Christmas so we didn't get too involved with decorations. We didn't even have a tree, it was depressing.

This year is different. We have no holidays planned until next year *sob*, so we had to get a tree. And put up some decorations. And drink eggnog. And make a Christmas wreath. It's been a fun weekend.

Crazy wreath ladies!

On Saturday we got up semi early to get our second day up the hill in. One of my favourite things about Sun Peaks is we get some random inversions happening. It means it will be freezing cold and raining in town, but then sunny and wonderful up the hill. There has been record snow for this time of year, which means our boards haven't suffered the rock death that they normally would for his early.

Saturday snow day!

Saturday night I had a girly night, with some Canadian friends attempting to teach me how to be crafty. I needed a lot of assistance. A lot. Luckily Alexis is super nice and stopped my wreath from becoming a Jersey Shore disaster. There was still bulk glitter, even with assistance.

The process!

On Sunday we went out to Woodward Christmas Trees. It's a Christmas tree farm just outside of Kamloops. They also have a wine tasting room. Amazing. We went out there on Sunday morning with Alexis and Hal. There is already snow, and it was a winter wonderland.

Tractor ride! Clearly I can't pull of the half shaved head look. 

We mastered the Canadian experiences this weekend. The weekend was perhaps only topped by O'Hara's last weekend. That weekend involved snow boarding, ice skating and hunting deer.

Penticton with Friends and Family

We've had my family in Canada for two weeks and O'Hara did an amazing job of host for the first week. They arrived after a long journey and thinking they were going to have a chance to rest a bit... but no chance of that. The first three days while I was at work they went hiking, downhill biking at Sun Peaks and canoeing down the river. None of those activities are restful!

Extreme downhill biking and kayaking

For the weekend we went to Penticton for a wine tour and channel float. Another item on the bucket list all checked off. Win! We also visited the farmers markets in Penticton and I had my first PROPER Aussie pie in about 18 months! You probably can't understand how good that was. It has since lead to the discovery that there is a pie truck in Vancouver by a different Australian. The bastards cost $8 a pop there but it's worth it.

MEAT PIES!!!

For our wine tour we toured again with Grape Escapes which was again amazing. We went to Naramata bench and visited 5 wineries and well and truly worked out our credit card. Our wine rack is stocked up for summer which is always good. Hopefully we get more guests to drink it with us!

On Sunday we braved the cloudy skies and floated down the channel. The original plan was to only do a half float, but the water was moving quickly so we decided to go the whole way. This. Was. FUN! We finally got to get out our giant floating Havs, luckily the water wasn't too cold as these bad boys are not really designed to keep you dry. O'Hara was nicknamed Señor Froggy as he wore a sombrero and pulled us around by frog kicking on his thong. It worked a treat!

Finny is a float dog with Señor Froggy 

Floaty float and now a floating eski dog

I love our weekends in Penticton, they're always a blast and it was great to see it in summer.

What's better than a Winter Wine Festival?

Nothing, it's a fact. Winter Wine Festivals are a win.

Last weekend we went with a bunch of friends to the Sun Peaks Winter Festival of Wine. This was a 2 week course of events held at a Sun Peaks, a local mountain resort. We went to the Progressive Wine Tasting event, which basically consisted of us wandering through the village tasting a bunch of local wines.

Cool wine glass pens and party of the crew

We had the most incredible weather all weekend, which meant wandering the village drinking wine was possibly one of the best nights we've had. Some highlights from the weekend, names omitted to protect the guilty!

• Quick snack of roast chicken sandwiches before wine tasting, and pounding cheese without crackers at the event
• Four snowboards were dropped off to get waxed Friday night, only one made it to the mountain on Saturday
• Someone got their nipples rubbed by a colleague during wine tasting
• Everyone always asking to try the Ice Wine
• Someone took "good wine" notes that significantly increased in quantity over the course of the night
• "Did you get that snow from outside?"
• "Can I tip it out?"
• One girl wasn't bashed by teens because they "heard she's a tough c*^t"
• One couple lost the group, then met us on the way to the condo carrying delicious bread
• Someone taught the Australians the value of a good rum snow cone
• One couple went all "European" and got nude in the hot tub
• The male nudie thought it was ok to try and wrestle people in the hot tub
• Someone's stress ended in swilling rum from the bottle in the hot tub
• Someone got drunk and went all SK
• Someone having no idea how they managed to get into to the top bunk
• Someone bled in the hot tub after being gouged by the nudist wrestler's nail
• Two girls sat up in bed watching Clueless and eating roast chicken at 1am
• 3 boys had 3 different yelling conversations until 3:30am in the hot tub
• One couple had to listen to this conversation through the window on the pull out sofa
• 4 of 8 people didn't step foot outside the condo Saturday
• Mimosas Saturday morning
• One dog having only child syndrome and never letting anyone pat the other dog
• Someone woke up Saturday, got dressed to hit the slopes only to stagger back to bed
• Pancakes and bacon one morning, and bacon and egg muffins the next
• One couple made a late comeback at Crib
• Cheese fondue for dinner
• Two "Blue Bird" days on the hill, with positive temps keeping the snow soft
• One couple graciously offered the master bedroom on night two, after spending a drunken, puking, full day sweating it out in bed
• 3 people started watching the Canucks game, until halfway though the 2nd period. We changed to Zoolander
• No domestics between the 8 people sharing a 2 bedroom condo

Class

Rum Snow Cone! The toads loved the wine

I'm pretty sure both O'Hara and I lost some brain cells over the weekend. On Monday O'Hara went to Ottawa for the week (around -20 deg C) and forgot to take a jacket. That afternoon I left the petrol cap off when driving home. Fails!