Taxi for wine...

[sail7seas]

This is only our second cruise coming up in Dec on HAL, but last year which was our first experience....and we are not wine snobs.....the wine selection was limited even in the Pinnacle Dinning room on the Westerdam... I struggled to find a good bottle for a special occassion. So we plan to bring a case of decent stuff for our upcoming trip and love the Total Wine in FLL.... its like a Home Depot.....a real treat to walk through.

 

 

Everyone's taste in wine is so individual and I love that about wine drinkers....wine chatting.

 

Which, to you, is the 'decent stuff' you like to bring? Please share your comments..... I am always looking for recommended new wines to try. We are definitely not wine snobs and have a great deal to learn.

[sail7seas]

As a wine enthusiast when I see a discussion about wine, I will join in occasionally.

 

My biggest problem bringing wine on board is that I'll find something on board that I've not seen before so I'll try it instead of one of my own. I've found myself leaving wine behind on disembarkation when I bring my own (always bring too much) because I don't want a hassle with the US Customs guys.

 

Lately I just don't bother bringing any on board other than maybe one or two or three super dupers from my own cellar (a Silver Oak '94, a Jordan '98 and a Dom Perignon for a celebration of some kind, for example).

 

 

 

Ahhh, Silver Oak. We've enjoyed a bit of that. One of my favorites. Our last few HAL cruises, the supply was very limited. I don't think they're loading much on anymore.

 

[terrydtx]

I have been buying all my wine lately from an online wine store in NJ. They ship free with no sales tax to Alabama if you buy a minimum of 4 bottles at a time. Most of their wines are reds and 50-60% off retail or original winery prices. I have yet to buy a bad bottle and already have my case filled and ready for next months cruise. I have some great California, Washington, Italian and French reds that sell for $45 or more and I bought online for under $20 a bottle that are consistently rated at over 90 points from national wine critics and magazines.:D

Here is a listing for one of their wines that just was emailed to me:

 

Hi Terry,

 

Today we are offering William Knuttel

Russian River Valley

Pinot Noir

Reserve 2008

originally priced at $41.60 and available now for only $19.99.

Ground shipping is free with your purchase of 4 bottle(s).

92 Points - Jonathan H. Newman!

[MainStreetMouse]

A part of my vacation fun is to visit wine stores and walk around like a kid in a candy store. Last summer in Naples while my wife went shopping in some of the big box stores I spent several hours walking around the Total Wine Store slowly putting together a case of wine for us to enjoy that week.

 

This is our first cruise and I was so happy when I discovered there was a Total Wine store close to where we are staying.

 

The savings is a bonus, and actually makes a lot of sense to purchase this way. I won't mind lugging a case of wine onboard.

 

Cheers!

Gary

 

 

I agree on the convenience factor, but on a 7-day cruise, the savings can be somewhat justified... IMO.

 

Northstar Merlot on HAL: $102

Northstar Merlot at Liquor Store: $36

 

Savings: $66

Corkage charge: $18

Final Price: $48

 

$48 x 6 bottles:$288

 

Maybe though this is one of those small things I shouldn't sweat, as Nancy is always telling me.. I need to start getting ready to relax for this cruise!!!!!

[keeponcruising]

I have been buying all my wine lately from an online wine store in NJ. They ship free with no sales tax to Alabama if you buy a minimum of 4 bottles at a time. Most of their wines are reds and 50-60% off retail or original winery prices. I have yet to buy a bad bottle and already have my case filled and ready for next months cruise. I have some great California, Washington, Italian and French reds that sell for $45 or more and I bought online for under $20 a bottle that are consistently rated at over 90 points from national wine critics and magazines.:D

Here is a listing for one of their wines that just was emailed to me:

 

Hi Terry,

 

Today we are offering William Knuttel

Russian River Valley

Pinot Noir

Reserve 2008

originally priced at $41.60 and available now for only $19.99.

Ground shipping is free with your purchase of 4 bottle(s).

 

92 Points - Jonathan H. Newman!

 

Helle Terry,

 

Can you tell me the name of the wine shop?

 

Thanks,

 

Ellen

[ASIWISH]

Ahhh, Silver Oak. We've enjoyed a bit of that. One of my favorites. Our last few HAL cruises, the supply was very limited. I don't think they're loading much on anymore.

 

 

When we were on the Celebrity Solstice last year, a passenger brought a bottle of Silver Oak to the wine bar and asked the sommelier to open it... the sommelier was very excited, and gathered the others sommeliers to look at it. They asked if they could try a sip, and the passenger obliged... about five of them tried it. It was pretty cool to see their excitement over a bottle they had only heard about...

 

The interesting thing is that the passenger brought a wine aerator with him... and not one of the sommeliers had heard of, or seen one... that seemed odd, and perhaps spoke of the quality sommeliers on Celebrity... (not a cruise line we liked, but the way..)

 

Good choice on the Silver Oak... as a side note: I crash into their winery in a hot air balloon a few years back... no injuries, but great stories... and some free wine!!!! (They acted like it was their fault for putting the winery there!!! HAHAHA!! Who was I to argue with them...?)

 

Edit: Come to think of it, does Celebrity let you bring wine aboard? I just realized that it now seems strange... isn't HAL the only one that allows it..?

[terrydtx]

Helle Terry,

 

Can you tell me the name of the wine shop?

 

Thanks,

 

Ellen

 

Ellen, the store sells only thought its online web site and I just checked and they can ship to FL. I hope I do not get into trouble for listing this with CC as I have no financial connection with this company just a great place buy good wine a great prices. The name is Wines till Sold out and I love to share good places to buy wine as much as sharing good wine to drink.:D

 

http://wtso.com/

 

Good luck

[gaelan]

Everyone's taste in wine is so individual and I love that about wine drinkers....wine chatting.

 

Which, to you, is the 'decent stuff' you like to bring? Please share your comments..... I am always looking for recommended new wines to try. We are definitely not wine snobs and have a great deal to learn.

 

We try to bring wine that we might enjoy equally in the MDR or on the balcony with some crackers and cheese......here are some we enjoy:

 

-Champagne: Veuve Cliquot - Works well for a sail away or a special occasion, crisp and clean

- Cabs: Cakebread or Groth are favorites from California big mouth and silky smooth, and yes....who would complain about a Silver Oak....such a treat

- Savignon Blanc: Love any from Austrralian Marlborough region.....must serve very cold in my opinion....nice crisp with hint of citrus...equally great for the balcony after a long hot excursion or the backyard BBQ.......more refined would be Louis Jadot Poilly Fuisse or a Sauvon Sancerre.....both very nice and great with fish, fowl or appetizers

- Big Oak Chard: Ferrai Carona from Napa...gotta like an oaky chard to try this one

- Easy drinking Pinot Noir: David Bruce...smooth...

 

Typically any french wine for cruises we would buy in the MDR as for us this tends to be more specific to what we eat or mood.

 

Hope this helps......so many wines and so little time to enjoy!!!:D

[terrydtx]

 

Edit: Come to think of it, does Celebrity let you bring wine aboard? I just realized that it now seems strange... isn't HAL the only one that allows it..?

 

X will allow you to bring aboard at embarkation 2 bottles per cabin but charges $25 per bottle corkage fee.

[sail7seas]

We try to bring wine that we might enjoy equally in the MDR or on the balcony with some crackers and cheese......here are some we enjoy:

 

-Champagne: Veuve Cliquot - Works well for a sail away or a special occasion, crisp and clean

- Cabs: Cakebread or Groth are favorites from California big mouth and silky smooth, and yes....who would complain about a Silver Oak....such a treat

- Savignon Blanc: Love any from Austrralian Marlborough region.....must serve very cold in my opinion....nice crisp with hint of citrus...equally great for the balcony after a long hot excursion or the backyard BBQ.......more refined would be Louis Jadot Poilly Fuisse or a Sauvon Sancerre.....both very nice and great with fish, fowl or appetizers

- Big Oak Chard: Ferrai Carona from Napa...gotta like an oaky chard to try this one

- Easy drinking Pinot Noir: David Bruce...smooth...

 

Typically any french wine for cruises we would buy in the MDR as for us this tends to be more specific to what we eat or mood.

 

Hope this helps......so many wines and so little time to enjoy!!!:D

 

 

Thank you.

Nice list.

 

Some I've sampled (and enjoyed); some I've yet to try.

 

So many wines and so little time..... :)

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

Kuhn Family..... Great story about the hot air balloon. :)

[keeponcruising]

Ellen, the store sells only thought its online web site and I just checked and they can ship to FL. I hope I do not get into trouble for listing this with CC as I have no financial connection with this company just a great place buy good wine a great prices. The name is Wines till Sold out and I love to share good places to buy wine as much as sharing good wine to drink.:D

 

http://wtso.com/

 

Good luck

 

Thanks Terry, I will try them out.

 

I live in S FL and have a Total Wine close by. I just booked a TA on the Eurodam next spring and am very excited. I haven't taken a HAL cruise since Dec 05. I am on the EPIC in a few weeks and am upset they just raised the corkage fee to $30 a magnum. I purchased 5 to take on and didn't mind paying $15 a bottle. But now at $30, I have to scale back. I am glad I won't have that problem next spring on the Eurodam.

 

Ellen

[MainStreetMouse]

I like the idea of binging several wines from our cellar. My problem is that we have to secure them in our checked luggage from Detroit to FLL. We have packed wine in our luggage before without a problem, but I do worry.

 

I have several vintages of Far Niente Estate Bottled Cabernet Sauvignon that I may bubble wrap and bring along. Far Niente is my favourite Cali Cab.

 

Cheers!

 

Gary

 

.

[Host Walt]

We try to bring wine that we might enjoy equally in the MDR or on the balcony with some crackers and cheese......here are some we enjoy:

 

-Champagne: Veuve Cliquot - Works well for a sail away or a special occasion, crisp and clean

- Cabs: Cakebread or Groth are favorites from California big mouth and silky smooth, and yes....who would complain about a Silver Oak....such a treat

- Savignon Blanc: Love any from Austrralian Marlborough region.....must serve very cold in my opinion....nice crisp with hint of citrus...equally great for the balcony after a long hot excursion or the backyard BBQ.......more refined would be Louis Jadot Poilly Fuisse or a Sauvon Sancerre.....both very nice and great with fish, fowl or appetizers

- Big Oak Chard: Ferrai Carona from Napa...gotta like an oaky chard to try this one

- Easy drinking Pinot Noir: David Bruce...smooth...

 

Typically any french wine for cruises we would buy in the MDR as for us this tends to be more specific to what we eat or mood.

 

Hope this helps......so many wines and so little time to enjoy!!!:D

 

My motto - Life is too short to drink lousy wines.

 

Your list is excellent. The Widow* (Veuve Cliquot) is, in my opinion, better than Cristal and Dom Perignon. But I'm biased. We visited the Veuve Cliquot winery in Riems a few years ago and loved the tour and the champagne.

 

Cabs - Groth and Cakebread Cellars are both excellent but I would add Kenwood to the list. (Our favorite is made by A. Rafanelli near Santa Rosa Ca., but it's a three person show with very limited production. Raffy, his wife and his daughter, who is the Merlot specialist, limit sales to 3 bottles at the winery and has a very limited restaurant distribution. La Gare restaurant in Santa Rosa has it on their wine list at a remarkably reasonable price.)

Sauv. Blancs - You nailed it. If it's from Marlborough New Zealand it's superb. Our favorite labels are Kim Crawford and Brancott, but any will do. Also, there are some white Bordeaus from France, which are essentially Sauv. Blancs., that are excellent, but they can be inconsistent. Same with Sancerres, but most that we've tried are equal to the Kiwi stuff...and more expensive.

Chardonnay - Ferrari Carano was our favorite when they started up 20 years ago, and they still are, but the tariff has escalated quite a bit.

Pinot - I agree as well with the Bruce, but pinot is a very fussy grape. One year a label may be top flight and the next it belongs in the dump bucket. It's hard to generalize but normally if a Pinot comes from Oregon it has a probability to be excellent. Problem is also that some Pinots age quickly and can be already "over the hill" when you pop the cork while others get better with age.

 

BTW, many of the French and New Zealand wines are now bottled with twist-offs rather than corks, which is better for transporting. Nothing worse than a failed cork allowing a lovely Cab from leaking out in your undies with the pressure variations in the baggage compartment of a plane.

* the nickname "widow" comes from the history of the winery. It was one of the first (perhaps the first) to develop the champagne process we know today. The son of Phillippe Cliquot inherited the winery and married Barbe Ponsardin who became a widow, thus Veuve Cliquot, but was the entrepreneur that made the wine the premium bubbly we know and love today.

[gaelan]

I like the idea of binging several wines from our cellar. My problem is that we have to secure them in our checked luggage from Detroit to FLL. We have packed wine in our luggage before without a problem, but I do worry.

 

I have several vintages of Far Niente Estate Bottled Cabernet Sauvignon that I may bubble wrap and bring along. Far Niente is my favourite Cali Cab.

 

Cheers!

 

Gary

 

.

 

MainStreetMouse...we attended a wedding of a good friend in Niagara-on-the-Lake last year... and took the oportunity to tour the Niagara regional wine area.....most of the wines were.... unfortunately undrinkable.....other than the Ice Wines from the region can you recommend something from Southern Ontario that we might have overlooked. I do remember having a Chateau du Charmes Chardonny many years ago that was good.

[Host Walt]

I like the idea of binging several wines from our cellar. My problem is that we have to secure them in our checked luggage from Detroit to FLL. We have packed wine in our luggage before without a problem, but I do worry.

 

I have several vintages of Far Niente Estate Bottled Cabernet Sauvignon that I may bubble wrap and bring along. Far Niente is my favourite Cali Cab.

 

Cheers!

 

Gary

 

.

 

Far Niente Cab is excellent but tends to have a bit more sediment than usual. I suggest packing some coffee filters (get the natural, unbleached kind to avoid getting a hint of the bleach in the wine) to filter out the sediment. Even if the sommelier offers to decant the wine for you, the ships motion can disturb the sediments.

 

Using a filter looks strange, but it will do the job quite well.

[sail7seas]

 

Sauv. Blancs - You nailed it. If it's from Marlborough New Zealand it's superb. Our favorite labels are Kim Crawford and Brancott, but any will do. Also, there are some white Bordeaus from France, which are essentially Sauv. Blancs., that are excellent, but they can be inconsistent. Same with Sancerres, but most that we've tried are equal to the Kiwi stuff...and more expensive.

 

Is this like a Cloudy Bay or Villa Maria?

 

[MainStreetMouse]

MainStreetMouse...we attended a wedding of a good friend in Niagara-on-the-Lake last year... and took the oportunity to tour the Niagara regional wine area.....most of the wines were.... unfortunately undrinkable.....other than the Ice Wines from the region can you recommend something from Southern Ontario that we might have overlooked. I do remember having a Chateau du Charmes Chardonny many years ago that was good.

 

In Niagara, the white wines are very good. Riesling and oaked chardonnay do shine. Pinot Noir from the Beansville Bench are also very good.

 

I focus in on wines from Lake Erie North Shore (LENS) and Pelee Island. A region southwest of Niagara and on avarage an extra 2 weeks of ripeness / year so the reds do well here. The cabernet's from LENS and Pelee Island are very good.

 

Gary

 

 

.

[ASIWISH]

Just picked up a Far Niente Chardonnay at Costco! $39, I believe...

 

Nice cold, rainy night in Chicago...! Perfect by the fire!

[Boytjie]

- Savignon Blanc: Love any from Austrralian Marlborough region.....

 

Nope, that would be from New Zealand. :D

 

New Zealand has better whites than Australia IMHO.

[Host Walt]

Nope, that would be from New Zealand. :D

 

New Zealand has better whites than Australia IMHO.

 

I agree. Kiwi reds are so so (some drinkable Pinots can be had from some small wineries in the south end of the South Island. But the best of their reds are normally not exported; there's enough local demand to consume their top stuff.) But their whites are excellent.

 

Two very good Chardonnay wineries are near Christchurch (Canterbury and Pegasus Bay) but, by and large, the north end of South Island (which includes the Marlborough region) produce world class Sauvignon Blancs, better, IMHO, than any made in the USA and even better than imports from South Africa.

 

We had a superb Pinot Noir last summer at Domaine Chandon in the Yarra Valley (near Melbourne, Australia). It's made only for local consumption so we bought the limit to bring back with us.

 

But the Syrahs (aka Shiraz) from Yarra Valley are superb and are suitable for sipping and pair well with most red meats.

[Host Walt]

[/b]

 

Is this like a Cloudy Bay or Villa Maria?

 

 

Don't know Villa Maria but yes, Cloudy Bay is equal to Brancott and Kim Crawford. I have several bottles of recent Cloudy Bays. They can go bad rather quickly so if you have any Cloudy Bays vintage 2006 or earlier, now would be a great time to enjoy them.

[fann1sh]

A wonderful wine discussion, and I had to chime in for 2 reasons.

 

MainStreetMouse - seems likely we live near each other. I'm in Chatham. Very interested in your LENS comments and link.

 

Gaelan/Host Walt - I've tasted all the "must try" champagnes, and for me none compare to The Widow. But, Spanish cava is my frivolous wine - disappointed HAL doesn't stock any. Until they do, I'll buy at Total Wine, and bring it aboard. Segura Viudas is a favourite.

[MainStreetMouse]

Hi fann1sh,

 

Yes, we are close, and you and a LENS winery very close to you. Smith & Wilson Estates. Always enjoy their wine offerings.

 

On our cruise I will probably purchase mostly California wines to bring on board, they are so much cheaper to buy in the USA verse the mark up our lovely government run LCBO`s add to the wine.

 

Gary

 

 

 

A wonderful wine discussion, and I had to chime in for 2 reasons.

 

MainStreetMouse - seems likely we live near each other. I'm in Chatham. Very interested in your LENS comments and link.

 

Gaelan/Host Walt - I've tasted all the "must try" champagnes, and for me none compare to The Widow. But, Spanish cava is my frivolous wine - disappointed HAL doesn't stock any. Until they do, I'll buy at Total Wine, and bring it aboard. Segura Viudas is a favourite.

[Host Walt]

A wonderful wine discussion, and I had to chime in for 2 reasons.

 

MainStreetMouse - seems likely we live near each other. I'm in Chatham. Very interested in your LENS comments and link.

 

Gaelan/Host Walt - I've tasted all the "must try" champagnes, and for me none compare to The Widow. But, Spanish cava is my frivolous wine - disappointed HAL doesn't stock any. Until they do, I'll buy at Total Wine, and bring it aboard. Segura Viudas is a favourite.

 

Just curious. Have you discovered any use for that metal base on the bottom of the Segura bottles?

[flashopper]

Walt and others. I would like a recommendation for a Pinot Grigio and a Vouvray (love it) for our upcoming trip. We are not well educated when it comes to wines.

 

Chris