Good evening!

As some of you may have read I’ve developed an acquaintance in the starting goalkeeper for the Canadian men’s national futbol team here in Canada Milan Borjan. This is due to him wearing sweatpants for the cold weather games up here in Edmonton, Hamilton, and Toronto. I made a parody twitter account that he found out about and apparently laughed away. A CanMNT rep reached out to me for Milan to send me a signed pair of pants and I met him after qualifying when we were in Toronto. The Voyageurs supporters group of which I am a member even had a chant during the Jamaica game that went;

“Borjan wears sweatpants everywhere he goes

clap, clap,

Everywhere he goes,

clap, clap

Everywhere heeee goooeeessss.”

Well, on Thursday night, indoors at BC Place he seems to have fully bought in to the bit as he wore sweats for that game too. My @borjanpants twitter feed exploded which is all in good fun. It’s amazing to me how many people think that I am actually him as Milan has no social media presence. I have had media people, crisis management people, advertisers reach out to me. I simply respond with I’m a pair of pants you have the wrong number.

Travel story time.

We will get into my love for futbol and how it came about. I went back to uni in 1999 and finished my degree after leaving for the mountains for a few years. During that winter I lived at my grandparents condo as they wintered in the US. I had no job, I overloaded on courses, got a gym membership and found a weed dealer for my spare time. The Premier league was finally being shown on cable and as I was/am a stoner the no commercials drew me in. Fast forward to the January of 2000 and I was taking my 1st overseas trip and starting in Portugal. I went with an acquaintance for the Portugal/Morocco leg who is a Portuguese speaker from Hamilton, Ontario.

The 1st night we partied very hard and wound up getting our hands on a brick of hash which was a superb surprise. The next day we saw that the two big clubs from Lisbon Benfica, and Sporting Lisbon were playing against each other and decided to get tickets. This was also the year that Peter Schemeichel’s wife decided that she wanted to leave Manchester and move somewhere nicer so he transferred to Sporting.

This is also the beginning of my scarf collection as on the day of the match for which my buddy had procured tickets I purchased a Sporting scarf.

We rock up to the game and I had a pipe and a brick of hash in my sock as we weren’t about to leave them at a hostel. I was proudly wearing my Sporting scarf when we got to the gate and the armed security folks. Soldierman started berating me in Portuguese for God knows what reason. He then quickly grabs my scarf and puts it in my pocket. I then get the pat down and he finds the stuff in my sock. He checks it out, gives me a wry smile and sends us in. I now find out that we are in the Benfica ultras section and my scarf could have gotten me beat up if not worse.

Game time approaches and the skies open up, I mean torrential rain straight down. No one goes anywhere, there are 70 thousand people in the old Estadio de Luz which is well over capacity in a deluge. As we know the Portuguese are not afraid of cigarettes, some would say they love them. During this ridiculous storm a lovely dome of cigarette smoke covered the stadium. Think NHL back in the day with everyone hauling on darts. The rain was so strong that it was flowing down the stairs like a waterfall where a shit tonne of people have to stand. Small children were yelling son of a whore at Schmeichel every time he touched the ball, we were taught the songs by locals, drank a bunch of Super Bocks and had a phenomenal time. I was hooked, am hooked and I only played the sport in high school but I will watch the most obscure leagues just for entertainment. (Hail Gamblor)

I now have over 90 scarves in my collection and some of the adorn the walls in my basement pub.

*Thank you to Zymm, 2Pack, Horatio, Hippo and Balls for the additions!

Wine time!

Well last week we looked at the Marlborough region in New Zealand, this week we will look at the rest as I believe Dunstan wanted to know more about Central Otago.

There’s a total of 10 wine regions spaced out across the country. Like mentioned before the go to grape varieties are Sauvignon Blanc, and Pinot Noir. No vineyard is further than 80 miles from the ocean so the vines benefit from the maritime effect with cool sea breezes at night. Let’s do a run down!

Marlborough – Most famous, most known, most popular.

Hawke’s Bay is the 2nd biggest region it produces a wide range of varieties but Chardonnay is strong here as are red blends like Bordeaux style Merlot blends. Merlot is increasingly the biggest percentage in the blends lending it to a right bank style. They also have some heat which allows my favoUrite grape Syrah do quite well here as well but it is made more Shiraz style than Rhone.

Central Otago is where Pinot Noir does amazingly well and it’s by far the most planted here. This is a mountainous region with 6 main sub regions which all have their differences on how the grapes are grown. Back in the day this area was mostly used for stone fruit but were converted to vineyards. The 6 sup regions in Central Otago make Pinot Noir slightly different from region to region so you would get a new world style fruit forward wine from one, and a earthy Burgundian style from another. Central Otago also makes chardonnay in the Burgundian style with mineral notes, full bodied and can be put down for years. (Yum)

Gisborne is basically all white varietals as they only grow 24 hectares of merlot and the rest are whites. The chardonnay here is more of the new world style, bursting with fruit, early drinking styles is what Gisborne is known for. The second most planted varietal is Pinot Gris which is the stone fruit style on the nose and on the palate. I prefer this style to the Pinot Grigio which I find a bit too citrusy and acidic. Give me a summer day with a Pinot Gris, or Pinot Blanc and I am a happy man.

North Canterbury is a region that I have not seen much from on these shores. The region is 200 kms of the South Island’s coast  that has the Alps to the West of them which makes for an absolute beautiful landscape. Here, Pinot noir and Sauvignon blanc are the dominant varieties with Riesling making an appearance in third.

Wairarapa which means glistening waters in Maori is like the others where Pinot, and Sauv blanc are dominant. A sub region here is Martinborough which makes absolute kick ass Burgundy style pinots. Martinborough has basically the same climate as Burgundy and free draining soils for the coastal rains. If you want to try Pinto from NZ, I suggest starting here.

Nelson is located on the northern tip of the South island used to be known for orchards but now the grape has taken over. Sauvignon blanc is the most planted here and they have a bit of the minerality of a Sauv from Loire which is different than the majority of that varietal coming out of the rest of the country.

Auckland is a big boring city with a wine region apparently.

Northland wine region is right bang up next to the sea and due to that they have a sub tropical climate which is sunny, warm and humid. This is the most northerly region that grows Chardonnay, Syrah, and Pinot Gris. I have yet to see anything from here up here but I am intrigued by Syrah being grown in a sub tropical region.

Waitaki Valley is on a limestone base that is free draining which is great news. It is a cool climate but has long autumns which stretches the growing season. Due to the proximity of the Alps they are always on the lookout for frost as it is a big issue. Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, and Riesling are grown here.

So if you are in the wine shop I hope this gives you more ammunition when you are exploring New Zealand wines. My fave winery is Craggy range if you can find it.