Don & Kully's World Cruise on Viking Neptune

Napier is the gateway to New Zealand’s second-largest wine-growing region, Hawkes Bay which boasts more than 70 vineyards. The first vineyards were introduced by the French missionaries in the mid-19th century (bless their hearts). The region is best known for Red Blends and Chardonnay. The city of Napier has an impressive cityscape of art deco architecture often compared to Miami Beach for its artsy splendor. Most of the art deco was built following an earthquake in 1931 that destroyed most of the city. The stunning “main street” design and art deco flair combine to create a city unlike any other in the world. Additionally, Napier is home to the National Aquarium and holds claim to the largest wool center in the Southern Hemisphere.

We only had six hours to explore this charming city and surrounding area. Since we have been enjoying the wonderful New Zealand wines, we decided to take Viking’s optional “Premier Estate Winery and Abbey Cellars” tour. We boarded our motor coach with approximately 20 other guests and headed out of the port area and drove through Napier where we got a glimpse of the art deco buildings lining the city’s main street. Every spring the city hosts an art deco festival to commemorate the 1931 earthquake. The community has a large collection of classic cars which are displayed and paraded through town by their properly attired owners during the celebration. A few of them brought their cars to the port today to show them off.

We had an excellent driver/guide who had lived in the USA for a number of years and now is retired and owns two large fruit farms in the area so, we got a firsthand account regarding not only grape growing but growing other fruits as well. This part of New Zealand is where most of the country’s fruit is grown, so the drive was through country farms and orchards.

It was about a 30-minute drive to our first Hawkes Bay winery, Brookfield’s estate winery. We were greeted by the winery owners who provided an overview about wine making and about their vineyard. We sampled four of their wines and despite the fabulous presentation, were a little disappointed with the quality of the wines. But we were in New Zealand on a beautiful sunny summer day, so we didn’t feel too bad about our situation.

We moved on to our second stop, Abbey Cellars. This single estate winery was established in 2002 and is owned by the Haworth family. We were able to taste six of the estates wines and were very impressed by all of their wines. The wines were served with a variety of local cheese and crackers. Our favorites were the Chardonnay and a Bordeaux style blend of Merlot and Cabernet. We bought a bottle of each to bring back to the ship to share with friends.

After the wine tasting we headed back to Napier driving past one of the driver’s farms where he pointed out the various grapes and fruits they were growing. He also provided a great commentary regarding agricultural practices in New Zealand. We highly recommend this tour.

Tomorrow we will make our final port call in New Zealand when we visit the capital city of Wellington.

“Adventure is out there.” From the Up Movie