Arriving in Napier we thought we had been teleported to America, the palm tree lined streets could easily have been LA. We settle on a beach side carpark for our first night, which is quite uneventful. Probably needed after the carnage of the last few days, plus we need to prepare ourselves for tomorrow.

11am, we get ferried out with mountain bikes to Vineyard Central. Today was hilarious. Unison, our first stop. Here we were given free chocolate to accompany the wine tasting, and also acquired our first bottle of wine: Recession Red, the strap line being:"The recession won't last forever, so enjoy it while you can!". We thought this was ingenious, and the wine wasn't bad either.

The journey to Te Awa, our next stop, was interesting. The wind and gravel road combination was ridiculous, plus it was freezing. Todders was whinging about 20m down the road, which didn't bode well. But we made it, and as a reward sampled their entire collection. Then, with the wine munchies, construct our wraps on a picnic table inside the grounds. Feeling revitalised we hot foot it to Trinity Hall, where we crack open our home brand tasty cheddar chese to aid us in our tasting of their entire collection! The girl serving here was as random as us, and told us that her boyfriend had cooked dinner for her last night. Bangers and mash - ordinarily quite yummy, but at the crucial milk adding stage he realised that he had no milk, so substituted with chocomilk - gross!

By now, already a little tiddly, we set the tone well, me arriving with my helmet on backwards (not intentional), and Todders turning Irish, and greeting our host with "Well hulloo there!". It was here however, that we managed to learn the most about the area and other wine making related subjects!

Gimlett Gravels, as the area is known - a bit of background. Once upon a time there was a river flowing through, which flooded and diverted its' course, leaving the dried up river bed as wasteland. The region was later developed for grape growing, as it was found that the geological makeup of the earth was similar to that of Bordeaux. The gravel earth left behind has three useful properties.

1) The gravel absorbs heat from the sun
2) The gravel provodes effective drainage
3) The vines struggle to root themselves amongst the gravel, thus producing small but flavoursome grapes.

As well as tasting their whole wine range, we also started on the olive oils and vinagrettes. Our favourite by far being the Manuka Honey and wholegrain mustard vinagrette. Then the day took an interesting turn, when Simon (our winery host), invited us to park Johnny on his drive that evening. After a brief stop at the local University (he's President of the student union) to use the internet, we head to his house, where we cook dinner and learn a new game: Dot Dot Dot dice game - hilarious fun which of course involves drinking when you lose a hand. We won't bother writing all the rules as that would be boring, but will teach those of you who wish to learn on my return!

The next morning we cook Simon and his housemate porridge, and in return Simon waves us on our way, giving us handfuls of apples. Random I know, Simon's uncle grows them and he can't do enough to get rid of them! Thanks Simon, you now feature on our Freebies list, and we hope that one day you too get the chance to go travelling in a campervan with someone you just met!!!!