Anne Krebiehl: Fifth blog from New Zealand harvest

On the coach again southbound from Blenheim to Christchurch: the route runs along the coast and to my right there is bush and steep cliffs, to my left is the Pacific Ocean. Fresh crayfish is sold at roadside stalls and I regret that I cannot just hop off to sample some of it.

I am meeting my London friend Jamie in Christchurch and once there we cannot stop laughing at the improbability of it all. Anyone coming from England to Christchurch would think he or she is in a parallel universe: you have come to the other side of the globe only to witness the ultra-English scene of young men in straw hats punting serenely down the River Avon.

All the names given to places and streets, the manicured Botanic Gardens and the neo-Gothic buildings of Christ's College are testament to the ideals on which this settlement was founded. In Cathedral Square there are plaques commemorating the arrival of the ‘four ships' at Lyttleton Harbour in December 1850: the Charlotte Jane bearing 157 passengers; the Randolph 214; the Sir George Seymour 216 and the Cressy 215.

All their names and occupations are written out: there are butchers, bricklayers, gardeners, blacksmiths, glaziers, wheelwrights, carpenters and farmers who brought their families of often numerous children. Some are simply termed ‘settlers'. They all came to create a prosperous Anglican community and clearly paid homage to their home country - which many of them never saw again - in everything they built and named.

The surrounding Canterbury Plains are mainly given to dairy farming with a few vineyards thrown in. One of them is Tresillian whose Pinot Noir 2006 Jamie and I sample over a dinner of green-lipped mussels and very tender lamb at one of Christchurch's best called ‘Cook'n with Gas'.

Just an hour north of Christchurch the vineyards of the Waipara region begin, most famous among them probably Pegasus Bay. Their tasting room is crowded and there is a lively buzz at their restaurant. The wines are divided into the Pegasus Bay Estate wines and their entry-level range called Main Divide as the mountain range of the Southern Alps is referred to, cutting the South Island in two distinct halves.

Particularly notable is their 2008 Riesling Bel Canto which is just off-dry with 8.4g of residual sugar, and their savoury 2007 Pinot Noir made from 25-year-old vines. I also visit Mud House, Waipara Springs (lovely 2007 Riesling and softly spicy Premo Pinot Noir 2007) and Fiddler's Green.

Barry Johns conducts the tasting and I am impressed with his delicate and zesty 2007 Riesling, again made in an off-dry style, and their limited edition 2005 Virtuoso Pinot Noir, fragrant and elegant in equal measure.

It is at Daniel Schuster, however, that I taste the highlight of the day: the Omihi 2006 Pinot Noir has all the fruit that one would expect in a Kiwi wine but also a depth, length and precision that is rare. The vines are 23 years old and this wine deserves a lot more time than I can give it. With every sip it draws me in more. The off-dry Waipara Riesling is also very pleasant.

Christchurch is rainy on my return and the next morning I am off again. Through the Plains, then through McKenzie Country, named after a gutsy thief who stole sheep in Timaru in the 1850s, found new pastures across a mountain pass, fattened them there and sold them on the other side.

His bravado must have struck a chord with the settlers, sublimating, perhaps, their own spirit of adventure and fierce determination to survive in this wild and beautiful new home country.

We continue uphill to Twizel and the landscape changes completely: ochre hillsides and very few trees, bare mountainous fields of dry grass, tufts of tussock and wild thyme, then the turquoise vista of Lake Tekapo with its little Chapel of the Good Shepherd. From the shores of the next glacier-fed Lake Pukaki I have a spectacular view of the snow-capped peaks and Aoraki Mt Cook in the distance.

Then, via the Lindis Pass on State Highway No 8 past Tarras and Lake Dunstan, we enter Cromwell and I am in Central Otago, arrived at last!

Anne Krebiehl

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