Sydney

Arrive sore, pallid, coughing and blinking in Sydney summer sun to visit the Laithwaites team who opened a sales office here last year. They call themselves 'Wine People' and work out of a tiny old house in Darlinghurst. (So this Christmas if you want to send wine to your Aussie Auntie, we will happily get them to do that for you. Just call my office or check them out at www.winepeople.com.au).

We opened up in Sydney partly because Australians are now drinking increasing amounts of European and American wines. (Check out any good Sydney restaurant wine list). Partly its to do with us being better placed if we are actually on the ground here to be able to dig out more 'real' (and rare) little Aussie wineries in a marketplace totally dominated by huge groups making 'brands' in huge factories.
And they are searching out quite a few farms, because there is a bit of a backlash in Oz toward sterile brands and a renaissance of small, start-ups going on - whose wines Laithwaites will soon have in the UK too.

But perhaps mainly its because - and this is a purely personal view - Australia currently sits at the centre of the known wine world - and if we are to live up to our recently being called 'most successful wine merchant on the planet' we really need to be present and competing successfully in the hottest market in the world; Oz.

So here we are; squeezed into this really tiny house with a 'dunny' out the back and listening to exciting tales that remind us so much of our own start-up in a wooden shed under a railway arch 39 years ago. Start-ups are hard going. And the Oz market is probably the toughest in the world.

That's why Aussie wines are so bloody good; here, if you are NOT bloody good you just won't survive. And many don't. There are no comfort-blankets of ' famous appellations' to protect you here; you've only your own name to offer and you are only as good as your last wine score.
Anyway our little team will have to fight very hard to survive. But they are a very impressive bunch of Aussies and Brits. I'll keep you informed.

Incredibly, in view of I don't know how many years of drought, it’s been raining in Sydney all summer. But we hit a period of four days of brilliant sun. Staying at the Sheraton on the Park (which is good), and walkable from the office. And also from Circular Quay, where the tubby Queen Victoria is moored and the elegant QE2 just arriving. Causing traffic jams and marooning us at Manly because the ferry couldn't squeeze past those two great Queens as they had a very slow, historic, ceremonial, passing hoot at each other.

Can I recommend The Boathouse on Blackwattle Bay if you like oysters and perfect, fresh fish. It’s next to the fish market.

We meet with family and watch nephew Martin do a 2km swim through shark-infested waters with hundreds of other Aussies, some considerably older than me. Mad, the Aussies, but you have to admire.

Argument with cocky wine waiter at Bondi Beach; I say there's no need for me to taste the Semillon first. Because it can't be corked, can it; it’s screwcapped?. Mate, It can still be oxidised he says. 10% of Aussie wine is oxydised. Nonsense I say Aussie wine is never oxidised. He pours the wine round and goes. We drink. Its bloody oxidised isn't it!

Can't swim at Bondi. Having the pacemaker implanted last week has left me looking all cut and bruised like the victim of a small shark attack.

There would be screams. So just stay clothed, British fashion, knotted hanky on head.