Wai, Waiheke and Wine

Friday was a day to enjoy. We had a late start, a breakfast of local fruit and good yoghurt, and then off to the ferry from Devonport (pronounced Dee-vun-port) to Waiheke Island, about an hour away. Waiheke is famous for being the place where the New Zealand wine industry started, and it lives up to its antecedents. On topof that, it's a beautiful island to the east of Auckland toward the Pacific ocean about 25 miles away.
We got off the boat, took a shuttle into the local village, Onorea, walked around a bit, then took the advice of a stuntman for the movies (who'd been in Lord of Rings) and his girlfriend, an Auckland commercial litigator, whom we had met on the ferry. They were on their way to a family formal Chinese wedding ceremony on Waiheke before taking off to Whistler, BC for her sister's real wedding--to follow the local ceremony. Some destination wedding! 10,000 miles. Anyway, they recommended Wai Restaurant for lunch. It was easy to find, perched on the main road of the village overlooking the bay, with mountains à la Bali Hai in the distance.

We were served at an outdoor table over the cliff to the beach by a delightful group of folk, one of whom, a very lovely 30-ish gent, made Ben a magnificent cappuccino. It may well be the best yet of the trip. Lunch began with two vini locale, a pinot gris from Podero Crisci Winery, and a sauvignon blanc from Passage Rock. John particularly enjoyed the crispness of the Passage Rock, as did Ben. The PC was slightly heavier and reminded John of a viognier. Our food was superb, probably the best meal up to that time: Ben had fresh berries and honeycomb to start and a Vietnamese salad to finish. John pigged out on cholesterol (for the first time, really!) with a wonderful lemon and blueberry scone to start, and a kidney, arugula, mushroom and cream sauce over Turkish bread for the main. We gradually walked down the hill to the beach after all that!

This evening we took the ferry into town to Soul for dinner in the Auckland yacht basin, near the ferry terminal. This meal was superb too: a glass of Two Rivers Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc to start, with salt and pepper squid for John and hapuku chowder for Ben (hapuku is a grouper fish), followed by a bottle of Stoneleigh Pinot Noir Rapaura Series 2010 with a John Dory for Ben and a snapper with chorizo for John. Meandered for a while around the 12 metre boats that the Kiwis keep in the local yacht basin for the America's Cup races, now more Kiwi than L'il Rhody in Newport, and the ferry home. John will probably reflect on the internationalization of cuisine in upscale restaurants at some point, but it was a lovely day.Tomorrow the bus to Rotorua at 8 AM, so off to bed for arising at 6 AM for a shuttle into town to the bus station. A bit sunburnt, but more probably wind-burned, because we have been slipping, slapping and slopping on the sunblock, but still spending nearly two hours in the wind on ferries. Gotta be careful in these Southern climes.