Hi folks – last day in Charm City – Baltimore! We had an early start this morning with the big sales meeting for our distributor in this part of the world – Bacchus Wines. We showed them the two star new wines of the moment – the 2011 Yalumba Y Vermentino and the 2010 Yalumba Strapper GSM – which have been winning hearts and palates at a rate of knots across The states of Maryland, Virginia and Delaware plus the District of Columbia (that’s the nations capital Washington for those folks from Australia that tune in) for this past week. So we’re leaving town happy, having caught up with a lot of old friends that we hadn’t seen for a while, and made a whole lot of new ones. I have a load of laundry in the drier to take care of as I’ve started packing for the drive up to New York, then a tasting with Michael Fishman over at Quarry Wines in Federal Hill. Then I need to show you what’s happening at the Wines Of Annapolis wine bar “Grapes” and the new DC Macarthur Park restaurant “Salt & Pepper”

See ya when we’re finished work and off to check out the cool old neighbourhood of Federal Hill.

PS i wasn’t joking – here’s the crab chips!

Happy Australia Day folks, we had ours in Washington DC.

We’ve just come back to Baltimore from our tastings with some of the restaurant sommeliers in DC, and our wine dinner at “Salt & Pepper” just outside of Georgetown in the MacArthur Park area. Sorry I ran out of steam late last night, as I wanted to write up our excellent evening with our Yalumba fortress in Annapolis – Wines Of Annapolis – but I just couldn’t keep my eyes open. It’s much the same tonight, so I will get to those both tomorrow.

For now, here’s the latest donut release from one of my favourite bakers – Dunkin Donuts. It’s called the ‘Snow Flurry’ and has snowy white custard creme inside. Yum

Morning folks, we made it to Delaware and back yesterday through serious winter rain, snow, fog and ice – well done the unstoppable soccer mom mini van! We’ve always been able to strike a good balance between working in the cities and the surrounding countryside – as it never fails to amaze us what interesting wine things we find going on out there. Perfect case in point was our visit to the town of Elkton, Maryland. Have a look at this photo – looks like a stop in every top road trip USA movie you’ve ever seen. But go inside, and I’ll guarantee you find one of the best and biggest collections of wines from around the world. Not to mention the education on American distillation that you can get from just reading the labels in the spirits section. Not convinced? Drop in next time you’re driving up to Philadelphia or new York City and ask for Rick Ostrand or John Murray. They’re the blokes that look like they could have just walked off stage as part of The Grateful Dead and they really know their stuff.

And then we crossed the Maryland : Delaware state line, and went a bit further north to Wilmington where we had a wine dinner organized by Frank – the number one man from Franks Union Wine Mart – At the Union City Grille. Here’s us in the dining room after the whole event – sorry about the quality of the fuzzy photo – must have been something to do with the low romantic lighting. From left to right, that’s the owner chef The delightful Matthew Curtis, me, and Frank the wine man in town.

Matthew did a really top job of using local and Australian produce with an American twist to match our wines – my pick for combination of the night was the “Shrimp on the barbie” – jumbo shrimp (‘prawns’ to us at home in Australia) that Matt soaked in brine with roasted garlic then seared off and served up with his own BBQ sauce and tempura battered onion rings.that went with the red black and blue berry driven savory 2010 Running With Bulls Temranillo.yes folks, that’s a red wine with seafood….and it was a winner.

There’s a freezing rain warning here this morning, folks, which means nasty icy conditions out there on the roads, which is where we’ll be today – in Baltimore Downtown, in Elkton (Maryland), and in Wilmington (Delaware). Lucky Danielle and I are traveling in the safe and sturdy soccer mom family van today!

But before I get to that, let’s just have a look at how the big game finished yesterday. The Baltimore Ravens had the game. With less than 1 minute on the time clock left in the last quarter, Ravens are 3 points down, and the ball went sailing into the end zone for a touchdown, the receiver caught it … and then dropped it … or it was more or less knocked out of his hand. And that was the difference between the Ravens going to the Super Bowl – which would mean two weeks of high times and build up in the bars and restaurants of Baltimore, which is good for everyone – and packing the football boots up and putting them away. Patriots win 23 – 20. I’m no expert, but the Ravens clearly outplayed the New England Patriots, and their pinup boy quarterback Tom Brady. Which brings me to the Ravens quarterback, and that would be sleepy-eyed Joe Flacco – who has really copped some criticism from “the experts” over the short time I’ve been here. Well, he let his game do the talking yesterday and did a great job. We were already solid supporters – the other night coming back to Baltimore from the tasting at Paul’s in Washington DC, we stopped off at Dunkin Donuts for coffee. They had this special doughnut made for the game – Joe The Quarterback. This is it … a doughnut filled with vanilla creme, topped with chocolate icing and purple sprinkles. Yum.

So to all our folks in Baltimore – the sales team, office, warehouse and delivery people at our distributor Bacchus, to the crew at The Bartenders bar, to the retailers and restaurants that have our wines on the shelves … we’re with you today! But be brave – your Ravens did you proud, and Ray Lewis said last night that he’s definitely going to be back for next season … and so will we!! I may just go out and get a Joe Flacco jersey today, as after watching the game with the Ravens crazies yesterday – looks like I’ve got a team. Or a Tori Smith (82) jersey or a Ray Rice (27) jersey. Then I’ll have to organize to be here for a game at the end of the year and start the new season in style. Go Ravens!

See ya when we’re back from tonight’s wine dinner in Delaware.

The streets are empty right now in Baltimore today folks, because it’s half time in the big NFL game between the Baltimore Ravens and the New England Patriots – that they’re playing up near Boston. That’s why all the good citizens of Baltimore have their jerseys on and have packed into the bars and lounge rooms to watch the game…….and the score is now 13 – 10 the Patriots way. Which is not a bad result because the Ravens are huge underdogs and staying in touch. I’ve been adopted by the local sports fans as a Ravens gal, so it looks like I now have an American football team.

This is the sports bar you want to be in to watch the game…..The Bartenders….in the Canton neighborhood. Andrew’s behind the bar and Chris is the master pizza and Chilli maker in the kitchen. OK. Have to go, second half is underway. Winner today meets the winner between San Fancisco 49ers and the New York Giants at the Superbowl. Fingers crossed for a miracle to happen and the Ravens to win.

OK folks, yesterday was our first day ” on the job” over here, and it was straight into the nation’s capital to the Australian Embassy for us – to see our good mate Mac who looks after the Wine Locker there. Mac is easily one of the greatest advocates for the Australian Wine Industry anywhere in the world – it’s a passion for him, and that’s one of the main reasons why there is such an excellent representation of regions and styles from our wine world at home tucked away safely under our Embassy on Massachussets Avenue. We did a tasting here featuring our new 2010 Grenache Shiraz & Mataro combination “The Strapper”, and the new blend of the fabulous old fortified -the 21 Year Old Tawny. It’s a hive of activity at the Embassy at the minute, as they’re getting set up for tonight’s big Australia Day event in conjunction with the Australian American Association. ***More on that a bit later on!

It was here that we nearly crossed paths with Obama, as he was at a charity event at the hotel opposite the Embassy, and we got a rock star car park for Danielle’s ( our gal in Dc, Baltimore, Virginia and the Carolinas) soccer mom mini van right out the front – nearly crossed bumpers with the convoy of Chevy Suburbans with the flashing lights and blacked out windows!

Then it was out into the DC suburbs to Paul’s Liquors in Chevy Chase for an in store tasting from 5.30 – 8pm with our rock solid long term wine rep from Bacchus ( our distributor in Maryland & DC) Sal the Smooth…..in a very nice way! Sal has a tremendous friendship with the Bellmann family that owns Paul’s, so we were able to have our own Yalumba table with 4 wines, and Danielle looked after Nautilus on another bench. Paul’s is a bit of a DC wine lovers institution, as it’s been out on Wisconsin Avenue since 1951. Rick, Steve & Sonny Bellmann have had the store for the last 25 years, and have an excellent selection of the interesting things from both the Old and New wine worlds. Rick runs the in store tasting program, so it was very good of him to let us get up close and personal with his customers – and for a chilly old Friday night – we did see a lot of folks.

I had the 2010 Y Viognier, 2009 Y Shiraz Viognier, 2010 Strapper and 2008 Patchwork Shiraz, and a stack of booklets that we made up at the winery WITH all the “where is Yalumba and the Barossa Valley” maps! Here’s the good news – we sold out the Y Viognier within the first hour, and the Patchwork not long after. We had a lot of fun, talked a lot about Vintage just kicking off yesterday at Yalumba with some Sauvignon Blanc from the Riverland to get everything working and primed for the local Barossa fruit. And we talked a lot about what food styles would go with each. By the time we packed up at 8 pm, we were at the last bottle of Strapper and Shiraz Viognier as well!! A top Friday night out in Chevy Chase folks – thanks to Rick, Sal and Danielle – and a good karma start to our Yalumba Visits America trip.

And here’s the fab old neon sign that’s been on the front of the store since it was built. Rick was telling me that he’s just fixed up some of the old tubes, as it’s never moving!

We’ll be back to DC today at lunch time to do an in store tasting with Elliott at Wide World Of Wine, then it will be into our princess dresses and off to the Australia Day celebrations at the Embassy for us!! Bring on the boys in their dress uniforms, I think Danielle and I will be in for a good time this evening. We’ll let you know tomorrow how it all went.

Still not quite into the time zone, but it will get an hour better each day now – by about Monday I should be good as gold. I just looked outside, and there’s a light snow flurry, so perhaps winter proper has finally arrived in Baltimore – it’s been unusually mild until now. So here’s what it looks like from my room right now. The hotel sits on the edge of Little Italy and the old jar outside neighborhood of Fells Point, and this is looking back across Inner Harbour towards the city. Hopefully it won’t get too heavy as we’re scheduled to head back down to Washington DC this morning for couple of events. I’ll just go make some coffee and I’ll be back with a report on our first official ” Yalumba in America” day for this trip – almost in the same place as Obama at the same time and everything!

It is cold here folks – 36 F = 2 C – yep that’s cold, especially when I’ve come straight from 39 C in the Barossa, then 32 C and 99% humidity in Malaysia……to a wall of chill here in Raventown. It’s clear out there, but I have no doubt there’s snow on the way because we’re already breathing ice in the air. The town has gone completely football nuts for the big playoff game on Sunday, and theyre calling it Purple Friday today with a big fan rally in the city, but we will be on the way to do 2 events down in Washington DC when that’s all going on.

Here’s the Ravens jersey for their running back Ray Rice, so you can see why it’s all purple around town at the moment. I didn’t realize either that the football team was named after the famous poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe, who was here in Baltimore back in the dim dark ages. In fact, it was his birthday celebration yesterday, and I got the whole story from a chat with one of the locals this morning.

And here’s today’s budget lunch suggestion – the $2.50 Turkish Taco – from one of the local lunch trucks. There’s a fleet of various lunch trucks in every American city I’ve worked in, and the food is usually pretty jolly good, and costs not a lot at all.

How’s this folks – went to buy cereal and milk at the local shop and there are just walls of shelves groaning under the weight of special Valentine’s chocolates. … .a lot of my favourite things actually. Here are a few with some weird sort of lips lolly pop thing. But hey, if it works. …. I might just have to plough through them during the trip on my own and do the research, and some lucky bloke may just get a pleasant well tried sweet choccy treat from me come February 14th. **Might have to save some of the better stuff for our seminar session at The Vancouver Wine Fair with Canadian #1 winescribe Tony Gismondi called Meet Your Match on Saturday March 3rd. Apparently it’s going to be like speed dating only with wine at each station instead of an eligible single! Should be interesting, and I can see the peanut butter heart working well for us with our wine – the 2006 Signature.

Any rate, have to admit that this is unexpected good timing – being in America for Valentine’s Day with all the chocolate benefits. It’s times like these you have to love the job!

Well folks, I flew cross continent from one coast to the other today, and here I am in Baltimore, Maryland – affectionately known locally as Crabtown, because of the city’s long-time love affair with every possible way of eating the crusty critters. Trust me – whilst we’re here we will be in search of the great Baltimore crab cake sandwich – just to show you why Baltimore has such a crabby reputation!

But right now, it’s not crabs, folks, it’s all about football … NFL gridiron football. As we drove into Baltimore in the Supershuttle tonight, the gateway to the city is literally underneath the massive M & T Bank Stadium – home of the Baltimore Ravens gridiron football team – lit up with bright fluorescent purple lights as the Ravens line up this weekend in the playoffs to decide the last two teams to contest the Super Bowl. There are Ravenstown banners everywhere and purple Ravens flags all over shopfronts and cars, leaving you in no doubt that Baltimore is definitely a full-on football town.

And we’ll be right here in the middle of it all this weekend as the Ravens play the New England Patriots up on their home near Boston. You know that we will all be wearing purple and black that day!

Just before I unpack and get organized for the eight days that we’ll be based here working in Baltimore, Washington DC, Annapolis and Virginia – check out my faithful traveling companion “Big Blue” – my indestructible old Samsonite hard shell suitcase. Each one of the last three big trips away I’ve thought I might have to replace him, but he keeps on keeping on. I reckon he’s done around half a million miles, and even though the locks cracked and there’s a couple layers of gaff tape holding it all together – it just won’t give up. I hope I hang together as well as my suitcase has – I’ll be thrilled to bits!