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Stepping Out of Auckland and Into the Wines of Waiheke Island

All this week, Special Jaunted Correspondent Eric Rosen takes us on a whirlwind field trip to New Zealand’s Other Wine Regions. Sure, now that it’s summer down there they might be sipping on those tropical, grassy Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc’s we’re all familiar with. But as he finds out, there's much more and most if it is within an hour of New Zealand’s major cities.

New Zealand only makes about 0.5% of the world’s wines, about half of which is exported, and the majority of that is from Marlborough. No wonder we don’t know much about New Zealand wines in the U.S., so we set out to get a little education. Our first stop was just a forty-minute ferry ride from Auckland: Waiheke Island. Long a hippie hideout in the ’60’s and ’70’s, idyllic Waiheke is now one of New Zealand’s premier wine regions with 17 boutique wineries scattered across its 93 square miles, a gourmet destination with beautiful beaches, and a weekend getaway for Auckland’s affluent set.

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