William Pollard Jr | aka: Wild 4 Washington Wine

2013 Vancouver International Wine Festival. After the morning  Blind Tasting Challenge , the kind people at the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts called a taxi for me. They bundled me up with a bag and a bottle of Mission Hill wine. Away I went, back to my hotel. I dropped off a few items in my room, put the bottle of wine in the fridge for later and prepared to meet a BC wine friend for lunch. Weeks before the Vancouver International Wine Festival (VIWF), I began engaging with Canadian bloggers and wine tweeters. Specifically, those going to the VIWF, those going to the 2013 Wine Bloggers Conference in Penticton, BC and those tweeting about BC Wine.

Drive + Hotel + Wine Reception + Review: Blasted Church 2010 Cabernet Merlot Monday, 25 February, I rose early for the 360 mile drive to Canada. I had been invited to attend the 35th Vancouver International Wine Festival in the lovely city of Vancouver, British Columbia. I was out the door and driving by 7:15 am. This was not my first visit to Vancouver. My first visit was in 1973, I was eleven years old. We lived in Seattle, so that drive took only two hours. Over the years I've visited Vancouver many more times. Although I've seen the city transformed over four decades, it remains one of my favorite cities in the world. For me, it's up there with London and San Francisco. I was eager to return. The drive was mostly uneventful; I stopped in Ellensburg and Bellingham for gas. A bad snow storm on Snoqualmie Pass made me grateful for purchasing Winter tires in January. The border crossing at Blaine went smooth and took no more than ten minutes in the queue. * Tip 1: ...