I gathered together five or six Merlots last night for a bit of comparative tasting. I won’t name names (yet), but it reminded me that that is not my favourite grape.

I know that Merlot bashing is now a popular sport ever since the film Sideways, and in truth I have had some great Merlots in the past, but in general terms Merlot is a really difficult grape to produce good wine from. humans talk about Pinot Noir being fussy. I reckon Merlot is even fussier.

We have a full house at the moment: Fiona’s brother and his family are visiting from Geneva, and Fiona’s sister and her family

are visiting from Devon. It’s fun, even whether it does stretch our accommodation facilities a little. We hit London yesterday, and had some fun.

We began with the Science Museum and the spy exhibition (which the kids liked) and the Spongebob simulator (which the kids liked, but I’m not certain what the science connection was), soon after went to the Rainforest Cafe for lunch (which the kids liked), before catching the Simpsons movie (which is fantastic). We had planned to do more, but it’s amazing how date flies, and how tiring a Saturday in London can be - it was unbelievably busy in town.

Original post by Jamie