Frog's eye view

Well not quite, but the best I could do for Mono Monday's theme.
There was no way I was going down on hands and knees in the rain, not even for Blip!

Posting a day late as we were out last night.
First wine club meeting of the New Year at an Italian restaurant in Leeds, called Viva.
We had the room down stairs, and it was very cosy to say the least.
34 of us, which is about 10 more than we normally get in January.
Nice to see a lot of new younger members, which we were when we joined over 20 years ago. Now we are " the old timers"!!

We had a very good tasting of Australian wines from two producers.
Tyrells  and Torbreck.
Their wines reminded us of French wines, especially the last two reds.

Torbreck Juveniles. ... So named because the owner of the vineyard was told that he would never sell his Australian wine to a Frenchman.  Well he proved them wrong, and a wine bar in Paris, called Juveniles,  was the first to buy his wine.Hence he named the wine, Juveniles. 
 
The last red, Torbreck Old Vine Grenache/ Shiraz/ Mouvedre, was a typical Southern Rhone tasting wine, and the one we liked best.

You won't find these wines in the Supermarkets, as they only sell to independent wine shops, and they were all priced between £10  and £16.
I have never been a great fan of Australian wines, mainly because they used too much oak, especially in their Chardonnay wine, but I loved all these. Just have to pay a bit more I suppose.