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Carroll
County
Maryland
Chapter |
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The 38th Annual National
American Wine Society Conference
Las Vegas, Nevada |
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A fine adventure in wines was the National Conference this year. The
setting posed quite a distraction, but the conference and the
sessions went off splendidly.
At left is a picture of some of my suitcase and wallet debris from
the trip. Let's have a look. Baggage tags - they don't make these
like they used to, they make your bag's handles all sticky now.
Session tickets - why didn't these get collected...? Boarding passes,
itinerary, Room key - won't need that any more. Ahh! My lucky dollar
airplane - I'll tell you later...
There are just some things about Vegas that aren't obvious, such as:
Rooms are fairly cheap. Food is fairly cheap (in large quantities).
Everything else is fairly expensive. AND many things that are free
at other hotels, are either not available, or are costly.
Take coffee, for example. Most hotels provide a coffeemaker, and
cups, with enough coffee and condiments for two. Not here. Room
service offers coffee, but it's a $10 carafe, and $2 for each
empty cup (I guess they're a bit heavy to carry down all those
vast corridors.) So, the rich or hopelessly hungover don't care, but
the rest of us have to don at least a T-shirt and jeans and make the
long journey to the little stand in the lobby, for $2.50 a cup. But,
true to form, it was rather good coffee.
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Special congratulations to Bill Eisberg for taking home FOUR
medals - 3 silver and one GOLD! He was stunned, but we already knew
how good his wines are. But we were also very happy, of course.
Here's Bill with two of his prize wines. Needless to say, they were marvelous. |
...Click photo for larger view |
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The Flamingo Hotel is quite large. I don't know how many rooms, but
there are miles of corridors. The hotel is a combination of
new and old buildings joined later, resulting in some very strange floorplans.
Connections from one section to another are not obvious at all. Later
I discovered that there is a staged arena somewhere on the lobby
floors, making an impenetrable barrier for the lower floors.
Suffice it to say, you almost have to walk through some part
of the casino to get anywhere else on the ground floor. Only by the
third day did we find alternatives to the smoke-filled dens pulsing
with the din of a thousand slot machines and gaming tables.
Early one morning another guest and I found it amazing that you could
get coffee without walking through the casino.
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The hotel had a lush tropical garden in the central area, blooming
with flowers, ferns, palms, and stocked with exotic birds - a real
striking image in the desert.
The garden has an extensive water system, stocked with huge Coy and
other exotic fish. These fish are larger than the five or more breeds
of ducks, but they all seem to get along.
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(Click on photos for larger versions)
The tropical gardens of the Flamingo Hotel.
A South African Crowned Crane will not take a similar mate. She has
her eye on the human keepers, and likes them around better. |
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Of course, the flamingos are the namesake stars of the garden, but
the penguins handily steal the show.
And here they are now.. |
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No, I didn't get all their names, but they are just adorable. Their
mating and breeding are under management by the Maryland Zoo. |
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From what I recall, the penguins are from South Africa, and do not
live in frigid climates, but temperate zones, like the U.S. They
still have climate controlled environments.
Feeding time for the penguins:
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At the Conference, the key note speaker was Kent Rosenblum of
Zinfandel fame. He has a very easygoing character, and told some
funny stories about himself and Sven and Olle from Minnesota. |
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Becky and I later attended a special presentation of late Rosenblum
Zins held by Kent and captained by Joe Fiola.
At left is Walt Rachele, Bill Eisberg and Tom Castronovo, wondering
how riff-raff like us crashed this prestigious affair.
But these were some great new Zins.
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The Hotel handled our events rather well. They seemed quite capable
of providing the enormous number of wine glasses to each session on time.
There were minor glitches, of course, but all in all a fine job.
Knowing Vegas, I'll bet they charged by the stem.
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Here's a merry crew, Bill and Barb Brown, with Barb Eisberg on the
right. (Sorry, I don't know the interloper in back, but she seems
harmless enough.)
People were really nice, and we met some new friends. But we like old
friends better. |
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At right, here's yet another Bill, Bill Davey with Bill Eisberg. I
think it's a secret cult... |
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One of the sessions was an Oregon Pinot Noir Blending Experiment,
held by Willamette Valley Wineries. We were given 4 wines made from
separate clones grown in various vineyards, and were challenged to
blend them as best we could in any way we liked... it was really
tough, but fun.
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...And I Won! Wuhu!
which made it even more fun! AND, I beat the winery's blend in a vote
from the entire session - and the blender was there! - Bonus. I
even picked my own blend over the winery's in the final vote. My
prize was a T-shirt, a and a bottle of the 2nd place blend -
the one the winery made. |
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At the dinner table, Bill and Barb need little reason to snuggle.
By the way, all the food and table service at the hotel was great!
This crew must be used to catering to another level - evidently not
one I'm accustomed to. They really spoiled us.
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At right are Bill and Barb Eisberg at the dinner. I tried to get Bill
to don his medals for this shot,
...like Mark Spitz...
but he had left them back at the room, miles away.
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Plenty to celebrate, good food, fine wine,
great company
...and Bill got 4 medals! |
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