Loved it. Loved it, not only because I love food and grew up watching Julia Childs PBS shows, while my mom folded laundry in the basement. No, I loved it because I had a chance to watch passion acted upon. Topo many of us have a passion we never do anything about. We all may obsess about it. But only a few act upon it. Gary Vaynerchuck’s “Crush It!
” is a book about how to “act upon your passion”. The problem though is that many people will read his book and just say “yeah that’s what I need to do” and go on thinking about it.

I think I have a solution. Do something stupid. Yep. Go out and do something quickly before you have time to think about it and figure out if it was the right thing later. I wouldn’t be in Spain right now if I had thought about it. Gabriella and I bought a ticket because we could, and look, now we live here. Our passion: exploring the world. At this point we’ve traveled throughout Spain and Portugal. Visited London and Norway numerous times, and have been to India. A series of lucky breaks and a lot of hard work has kept this project/dream/experiment alive. But we’re doing it, and we wouldn’t be here still if we had thought about it.

Juila and Julia both did something, whether or not they were sure what they were doing. They figured it out along the way. They had fun. They made their dreams come true. My dreams are still figuring themselves out…but I’ll keep doing what I need to do, and from time to time, I’ll jump feet first into something I know nothing about, just to see what happens.

Enjoy the chickens:

Had a chance to visit the Portabella Road Market on our last day in London. Realized that I really miss living with diversity around me. So many smells, foods from strange places, mixes of old and new, London is pretty magical, no matter how much people complain about the rain. Can’t wait to get back, my to do/to see list is growing as I write this. Plus I think I need a pint of bitters.

This week as changed the playing field. After 5 yrs of hard work, trying to figure out what we are doing here, I feel like it’s starting to make sense. The London International Wine Fair turned out to be a chance for us to both learn about what we actually know and to share that knowledge with others. Dinner with the Circle of Wine Writers where we were welcomed with open arms, and a glass of wine with Jancis Robinson. Both surreal, exciting, and full of future possibilities. 

Life is good. More soon…

The past few weeks have been a blur. First I was in Madrid and at FENAVIN, and then after a quick night or two in Terrassa, I’m back in London for the London International Wine Fair. This trip includes a dinner the night before the fair with the Circle of Wine Writers, a group that includes Steven Spurrier, Jancis Robinson, Oz Clarke, Charles Metcalf, and many more “names”. The odd part is we’re there as “equals” if you will. In no way am I saying we’re as important in the wine world, yet, but we are writers, who do our best to educate others. Hopefully with some good results.

And while we don’t agree with them all the time, we do appreciate what they have done and who they are, and it will be an honor to have the chance to hang out with them.

We’ll be having dinner at a restuarant here in London and all I have to say is that I would not want to be the sommelier on duty that night!  

Cheers, 

Ryan Opaz

click image for larger version

One of the best parts of visiting London is the beer. Nothing like a pint of beer that has flavor, complexity and doesn’t taste nasty. Sorry Spain you can do wine fine, but beer is not your forte. Seriously you have crap beer. There are a couple of Catalans trying to change this, but for the most part, your lagers, taste like: shit. It’s true.

So thank you London for helping me get my fix of British ales. Never enough, but absence does make the heart grow fonder! 

I have no true favorites, but I am partial to Pale Ales, IPA’s and a darker amber.

I promised myself after restarting this site, that I would post daily. Turns out trips have a funny way of making this hard to do. Also the fact that I didn’t plan ahead. Lesson learned. 

First time to London, to actually see something, and turns out we saw a lot. At one point we took a 5 mile hike across a big part of it. Felt good, though I sit here now having returned with a scrambled head. I liked London…a lot. More than I expected. Living here in Spain and it’s monoculture of foods, and at times wines, London was a small large wake up call to something I knew about myself, but seem to have forgot, I like variety. London is pluralistic, in food, people, wines, beers, though maybe not weather.

During our all too brief visit we ate sushi, steak pies, fish and chips, some of the best steaks I’ve ever had, and a few real breakfasts, full of grease! I drank beers that had complex flavors, came in a pint glass and did not need to be chilled to death to mask their rancidness. I drank wines from Italy, Austra, Australia, Spain, Portugal, Argentina, Madeira, England, Germany, Alsace, and more. I meant new people, many new friends. Had conversations that I’m still trying to figure out in my head, and stayed with a good friend, whose family makes a nice substitute when ours are so far away. 

This picture I’m going to title, “Dali and Big Ben meet under a Street Light”. It sums up the trip for me, I think.  I’m still trying to figure out what happened in London. It might be that I just miss the ability to communicate flawlessly in my native tongue. Though I think it was something much deeper. I’ll be trying to figure out here and over at Catavino, stay tuned.

I really liked London. I need to digest it a bit, then I might start to make sense. But first some beer and a dram of scotch…till soon r.