This weekend, myself and a friend of mine from my trip to Greece trekked to North London for The Wine Show at the Business Design Centre (which you may or may not remember was also the location of last year’s Beer Show). Despite a rather stunning lack of wine knowledge, I managed to fully immerse myself in a wine-tastic afternoon and learned quite a bit about the different styles available.
The format of these shows is a bit like a car boot sale crossed with a tasting session. Upon arrival, James and I were given wine glasses with which to sample the wares of the various wine vendors who had sent in their stocks from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Portugal, Spain, France and, of course, California (I was quite pleased with myself for recognising the Kendall Jackson brand as a California wine). James was much more wine savvy than I was, but even his knowledge was put to the test by the range of Merlots, Shiraz, Roses, Pinot Noirs, Nobels and more available to sample.
We were particularly impressed by the Wine Tasting Case or, as it was much less elegantly called - box of wine in a tube. Although the idea of wine in a tube seemed more appropriate for a college test tube/mad science themed party, in fact the idea of a series of fine wines for tasting, a guide book for how to best enjoy the samples and a taste of the most expensive wine in the set won us over pretty quickly.
We were also fans of the variety of Nobel wines, created from grapes affected by nobel rot. The saccharine dessert wine tasted more like sugar water than alcohol but was quite a nice alternative to the heavy reds and crisp whites and roses.
We even found a couple of stalls showcasing their non-wine products. Buffalo Trace distillery from Kentucky gave us a taste test of their whiskeys. The whiskey was lovely but not nearly as nice as their homemade whiskey barbecue sauce which, after demanding a sample of that as well, we decided would be delicious on just about anything edible. Although I was content with the whiskey and sauce, James noticed some rather poisonous looking bottles of Absinth and, after being provided with a sample of that as well, just barely had the self restraint to keep from buying one of the 40 quid bottles.
We had a fantastic time at The Wine Show and although I came in knowing very little about wine, I found myself picking up the lingo fast enough. Now, who’s up for a glass of earthy, nutty, full-bodied, oak-aged red?
Before I break my record for longest amount of time ever without updating my blog, and at the same time get massively behind in all of the amazing things that have been happening here in London and at The Top Floor Flat, I’ll try to get caught up with an event from last Monday.
In what was perhaps the second-most quintessentially British evening of my stay in London to date (following last year’s last night of the BBC Proms), last Monday Alex took me to see the Fulham Football Club’s premier league match against northerner team Hull.
Although I would call myself a football fan, I can’t say I had done much about following the sport. But I knew enough to support Fulham (my local team) and had walked or jogged past their stadium a couple of times so I was quite excited to see the inside of the grounds and support my team. Although they haven’t been performing particularly well this season, they promised to be fairly evenly matched against Hull.
The stadium is a fantastic old pitch right alongside the river. The south side of the grounds opens out onto a walkway along the Thames which must be fantastic in the summer and spring, especially for afternoon games. Although it was already dark by the time we arrived, and getting a bit chilly, the crowd was well up for it with both Fulham and Hull supporters turning out in force - especially considering it was a Monday night.
It ended up being a fantastic match, with Fulham taking the lead right at the end of the first half and scoring a second halfway through the second half to beat Hull 2-0. I was so excited to have the opportunity to see a match and really look forward to going again soon.
A fun bit of sports trivia that I happened to discover the same day - Fulham Football Club and the Boston Red Sox will be pairing up to do some cross promotional marketing. I knew I had picked the right footie club to support ;-).
Another insanely hectic week - astute readers will note the complete lack of promised editorial about London Restaurant Week. I’ll see what I can do this weekend but will be slightly distracted in a hunt for a Halloween costume - I’m aiming to go with homemade Halloween costumes this year and my friend and I are off to trowel vintage shops. Hopefully a lot of pictures will follow that excursion! In the meantime, take a look at Carey Jones’ slideshow from London food markets on SeriousEats.com and keep an eye out for her decidedly more professional reviews.
In the meantime, however, the Spoonfed office received a surprise this week in the form of some incredible urban art to jazz up our workspace. In a secret project that lasted from seven in the evening until three in the morning, the office was transformed by graffiti artist Inkfetish. Take a look at the final outcome:
As my desk is smack-dab in the middle of the mural I’m hoping a bit of the cool will rub off on me over the next few weeks. In the meantime, it’s pretty easy to agree that Spoonfed has become pretty much the coolest place to work in London.
A quick photo update and hopefully a bit more of a recap in the next few days for London Restaurant Week of which I caught the tail end this past weekend. Here’s a look at some of the delicious things I saw at open air markets around the city:
The only thing left to share is my brief visit to the Acropolis in Athens. One of the most important locations in the western world, the Acropolis is home to the Greek minds that are credited with such important contributions as democracy and geometry, not to mention being one of the most iconic locations in the world. Much of the area is undergoing restoration, including the famous Parthenon and I only had about an hour in the area before I had to dash off to catch my flight but a morning at the Acropolis was a fantastic way to end my visit to Greece.
I had such an incredible time in Greece with the Busabout Trip and I hope I’ll have a chance to return.
Busabout Adventures website had made it quite clear that there would be a fair amount of drinking and partying on the itinerary for those who wanted to take part but what with being sick and having so much to see on the previous islands, I hadn’t really spend much time enjoying the Greek island party vibe. All that was about to change on Ios as both the island and our accommodations were perfectly suited to having an amazing night out.
Far Out Village, where we were staying, had the nicest individual rooms of any place we’d stayed as well as the nicest beach. After our midday arrival, no one wanted to do much more than lie on the beach and explore the resort. The more active amongst us managed to gather enough people for a sandy game of American football but it wasn’t until dinner that our second wind hit and Dax led us into town for the night.
Our pub crawl through Ios saw the unfortunate loss of my sweater and a great deal of cash (spent on cocktails, not just lost) but I was having so much fun that I didn’t even realise the time until I checked my phone and saw it was 4am. Our evening had taken us to Flame Bar where their music, three months out of date, provided perfect familiar tunes to sing along to; Orange Bar where their specialty drinks menu looked like a vending machine (featureing Twix, Maltese, Mounds and Snickers drinks); and to Slammers – possibly the most horrifying of the bunch where their “specialty” was to place a helmet on your head, serve you a drink, then slam you over the head with a hammer, skateboard, milk carton, or fire extinguisher. Needless to say I didn’t take part in that last one but the boys of the group seemed to enjoy the experience.
Despite my late night, I awoke relatively early and itching to get out and explore Ios in a more civilised way. First, I took a hike up to the top of a nearby hill which gave me a fantastic view of the island. By the time I returned, a number of the others in the group had gotten up as well and a small contingent of us, including two guys on my trip who were classics majors at Oxford and therefore up for some of the more historical and academic sights the islands had offered, rented ATVs to trek the 20 kilometres across the island to what locals claimed was the tomb of the blind poet Homer (famously the author of the Odyssey and the Illiad).
I had never done anything quite like that before and really enjoyed the ATV trip over the hilly terrain. Whether or not Homer was entombed at the rocky monument we visited is a moot point, and after trying (and failing) to remember something of significance to quote from The Odyssey we turned the four-wheelers around to head to the port for lunch.
Another lazy afternoon turned into another epic evening, this time resulting in a 5am return to my comfortable room. It was a good thing that our transfer to Athens wasn’t until quite late the next day and I took the opportunity to sleep in, then laze the day away next to the pool.
I was surprised by how much fun I had in Ios, never really thinking of myself as the party type. But dancing through the night with a great group of people in the warm Greek evenings was exactly what I didn’t know I needed on my holiday and despite the late nights was feeling healthier and better rested for the trip than I could have imagined. After all of that, I can’t say I was too happy to see my trip end – in fact all I had left was a few hours in Athens before my flight back to London.
If Mykonos had the best mythology, Santorini – which was already winning hands down on beauty points – definitely was a close second. Home to two massive volcanoes, Santorini used to be a round island but is now a crescent moon shaped bit of land enclosing the volcanoes that are now islands in their own right. The massive eruption that caused this change in scenery is not only credited with causing the downfall of the mighty civiliasation of Crete when tidal waves rocked their island, but some also say that Santorini or a nearby island was home to the lost city of Atlantis which disappeared beneath the waves.
Lost civilisations aside, the volcanoes were also responsible for an incredibly unique island formation and Santorini’s landscape alternates between sheer cliffs on one side and long sloping beaches on the other. Although I didn’t have a chance to explore the famous red, black and white beaches, instead opting for the volcano tour, it was quite clear that I could easily spend a week on Santorini and not run out of things to see.
Because we had arrived and checked into our hotel relatively early, I was able to spend the afternoon exploring the town of Thira (also the official Greek name for the island) on my own. It was absolutely gorgeous and even after a few minutes of window shopping, also obvious that this was the place to go for unique jewelry and emptying your wallet. I met up with the group for dinner at a stunning restaurant practically jutting out over the water where we managed to order about twice as much food as necessary and take more pictures of the view than was probably strictly necessary.
The next day, and our one full day in Santorini, the majority of the group made our way down the donkey trail that navigated the cliff face to board a boat from the old port. The short boat ride took us first to the larger of the two volcanoes which is currently dormant. Although there were no boiling pits of lava, we did notice numerous sulfur chimneys releasing the gas into the air – according to some sources, the Oracle at Delphi sat on a sulfur chimney, breathing the fumes and inciting her prophecies. Although we didn’t have any babbling Cassandras in our midst, we weren’t ready to give up entirely on organic remedies from the volcanoes as the next stop on the boat was the hotsprings at the base of the second, and active, volcano. While the ‘hot’ springs were certainly more of a lukewarm, the rich mud in the water became a natural exfoliate and, a fact we didn’t realise until later, a brown dye for everything we were wearing. Oops.
On the boat ride back to the old port, the skies, which had been somewhat overcast for the first time in the trip, opened with a vengeance. Any plans to walk back up the donkey trail to town were quickly scrapped in favour of the gondola that would speed us and our now sopping belongings, to the top of the cliff. A hot shower and change of clothes later, we were all feeling much more comfortable but less than optimistic about the plans for the sunset dinner at the other end of the island. It was still a bit overcast and damp throughout the remainder of the afternoon – as I returned to the shopping streets of Thira – but by dinner time it had cleared enough for us to risk the trip to Oia, the town on the northern most tip of the island.
Oia was, if possible, even more gorgeous than Thira and whatever bad weather we had suffered during the day seemed to have cleared the air for a stunning sunset. We were completely in awe of the sky show and followed the natural fireworks with a lovely dinner in Oia and, after a bus ride back to Thira, an evening of drinking and dancing in town. Although we were all energised and ready to dance until dawn, the very large Aussie contingent on our trip set the tone for an early night – with the intention of getting up at 6:30am the next day to head back to the pub where they would be screening the Australian Football final. While I couldn’t be bothered to get up that early, at around halftime I joined in the fun and, despite still being rather unclear on the rules, had a fantastic time.
Our time on Santorini was way too short and I would have happily stayed another week but with my health improved and only a few days left of Greece we were off to Ios, the party capital of the Greek islands for some more hedonistic entertainment to finish off the trip.
After the busy streets of Mykonos, the myriad of bars, clubs and pubs and the party island feel; Paros was another world entirely. Our Busabout group arrived at our lovely accommodations, just a short walk away from the quiet main street in Paros, and settled in to home for the next two nights. The first night, Dax took us on a walking tour of Paros with the major highlight being the Church of 100 Doors. Although the significance of the church seemed to be a bit of a mystery all around, the legend says that, of the original 100 doors, only 99 remain, the final door having been stolen by the Turks. It is said that if the final door is ever returned, Istanbul will fall. With that bit of pseudohistory to entertain us, Dax led us to a great seafood restaurant where I indulged in some swordfish kebabs but unfortunately by that point I had realised that lack of sleep, the stress of planning a trip and the ability to relax in Greece had all combined to slam me with a rather nasty cold. Instead of join the group for an evening of partying in Paros, I instead returned to the hotel for an incredibly early night in the hopes that the cold would clear by the next morning for our boat ride.
Since we met in Athens, Dax had been talking up the Paros excursion, a day-long boat ride from Paros around the neighboring island of Andiparos as one of the highlights of the entire Greece trip. Not only did we spend the day at sea on a boat, but lunch saw us stopping off at a small, isolated beach where our boat captain would grill up fresh octopus, sea urchins and crab along with pork and chicken skewers. This would be served alongside Greek salad, fresh bread and as much Ouzo as we could be convinced to drink (Ouzo is the local alcoholic beverage of choice, tasting a bit like sambuca crossed with motor oil). Of course the boat would be well stocked as well with an endless supply of red and white wine to take the edge of the sea breeze and cliff jumping.
Despite my still rather stuffy nasal passages, with all of that in mind I had no intention of having anything other than a fantastic time so, sunscreen, tissues and camera in hand, I boarded our sailboat.
It was without a doubt, one of the best experiences I’ve ever had, and the sea air definitely had a positive impact on my cold. Between dancing on the deck, lounging on the beach, tasting octopus and sea urchin and managing to get red wine all over EVERYTHING in sight, we even managed to take a few rolls of pictures and videos which were converted into the following music video for the day’s theme song (note, if you’re offended by bad language, this song is about as bad as it gets. The song, ‘I’m on a Boat’ is done by musical comedy troupe Lonely Island known for their funny yet rather graphic songs that have appeared on SNL).
After a day on the boat, our return to Paros was marked by most with another night of partying but still nursing a cold, I decided to take another night in, hoping I would feel better the next day for our early transfer to the island I had been most looking forward to seeing – Santorini.
While I saw very little of Paros, between our boat trip, the amazing food and lovely hotel I have some of the best memories from that little island. However with my health returning and Santorini ahead, I had plenty more to look forward to….
So, having had a few days to recoup from the epic adventure that was my Greek Island tour, I suppose it’s about time to start recaping what exactly went down in the Aegean. I’ll break this up into different posts based on the islands we visited and what we saw there but first a recap of the trip overall.
I travelled to Greece to meet up with the Busabout Adventures Greek Island Hopper group. Busabout is another tour group under the umbrella of Radical Travel so this now marks my third trip with them (previously I travelled to Ireland with Shamrocker and Wales with Haggis Adventures). I met up with the group and guide to get all of our transportation details and itinerary for the trip at the port in Athens at 6:30am, approximately seven hours after I had arrived the night before so I wasn’t exactly bright eyed and bushy tailed. Because we were one of the last tours, and just squeezing into the end of the off-season, there were only nine of us in the group but the people on my trip ended up being so much fun that it was hard to imagine that an increase in group size would have done anything except make our transports more crowded.
The ten of us, including our guide, got to know each other on the first boat – a five and a half hour ferry ride to Mykonos, our first port of call. Along the way, the ferry stopped off at Syros and Tinos. Anyone who had been napping was given a forceful wakeup call at Syros where local vendors selling the island specialty, homemade nougat, boarded to sell their wares – a process that involved shouting in Greek at the top of their lungs about the quality of their goods, the price, the nougatiness of the nougat and possibly a wide variety of other things we couldn’t understand.
Upon our arrival at Mykonos, we got some of the local history and mythology from Dax, our Busabout guide. With the most interesting mythology of any of the islands we visited, Mykonos is famous for being the battleground of the Olympians and the Titans (the precursors and parents of the Olympian gods including Zeus, Apollo, Athena and all the rest) where they fought for control of the world. Mythologically speaking, this explains the barren, rocky, wind-swept landscape of Mykonos; supposedly it is still scarred from the epic, godly battle. Mykonos is also the point of departure for any tours of Delos, one of the most sacred places in Greek mythology and the birth place of the twin gods Apollo and Artemis. In more recent and verifiable history, Mykonos was also subject to repeated pirate attacks which explains the maze-like streets and impossible-to-navigate city centre.
I was disappointed to learn that Monday, the only full day we’d spend on the island, was the one day tours didn’t run to Delos so I would miss out on the chance to visit that particular historical site but my disappointment was quickly driven from my mind when I saw the beach where we would be staying. In a set up highly reminiscent of my trip to Cancun, beach chairs, a nearby bar, clear waters and sunny skies characterised the landscape and although our basic sleeping conditions certainly weren’t any five star accommodations, the beach more than made up for it.
After getting settled, Dax took our group into the town of Mykonos for a brief tour. We started out at the famous windmills which previously covered the island, working quite effectively in the high island winds, but now remain just for tourist photos; then followed Dax into the maze of the town. A particularly beautiful part of the city was known as Little Venice for it’s seaside dining and beautiful buildings. After a traditional Greek dinner and some cocktails in a bar overlooking the Aegean, I turned in early to catch up on my sleep and prepare for my own tour of Mykonos the next day.
As Delos was unavailable, myself, a the other girls on my trip, decided to head back into town for exploration, shopping and lunch before relaxing on the beach the next afternoon. We had an amazing morning wandering through the streets, getting entirely lost and, to our amazement, beginning to figure out how to navigate the maze by the time we were ready to return to the beach.
It seemed like far too short a time on Mykonos before we were loading our bags onto the less than affectionately named “vomit comet” or high speed ferry that would take us to Paros, the second island in our tour, but we had a fantastic first island experience and were all looking forward to part two!
In a dark warehouse in London Bridge, I cower before the heavily armed militia that s just burst through the door. Full SWAT gear adorns our attackers as they shove flashlights and machine guns in our faces. I, and the others in the warehouse, are interrogated...
Don t worry, opens Jace Everett. I will be playing that song. There s a laugh from the audience but also a sense of relief. That song is why there are so many Londoners in Bush Hall on a Wednesday night to see an up and coming American alternative coun...
Factory Theatre group increasingly pushes the boundaries of performance and production. In 2008 they brought us Hamlet with no costumes or props; in 2009, The Seagull with no script; and now, with Round 2 at The Electricity Showrooms, The Factory brings...
I ve been singing the praises of the collaborative creation of Courvoisier and jelly makers Bompas and Parr ever since I heard about plans to create a giant punch bowl so big one could row a boat across it. The idea of a bowl of punch where one could...
I ve been singing the praises of the collaborative creation of Courvoisier and jelly makers Bompas and Parr ever since I heard about plans to create a giant punch bowl so big one could row a boat across it. The idea of a bowl of punch where one could...
