We are on the train from Limerick on the way back to Dublin. We travelled down this morning,  which took about 3 hours. Now Limerick is an ancient city formerly inhabited by Vikings and more recently by Frank McCourt of Angela’s Ashes fame.

We are here to launch Durvillea with the O’Briens Wholesale team. Durvillea will be a restaurant brand in Ireland. It is a challenging market in these times but Mike Curran is doing a great job and we wish him well. The weather today in Limerick is also challenging. It has been raining for a week and there has been a lot of flooding and road closures. Tonight the Shannon river is expected to flood and conditions are expected to worsen. In spite of this it has been great to begin in this market and to get to know Mike, Lynne Coyle the Head Buyer for O’Briens, and of course Kevin O’Brien. So here we are on the train with a bag of lovely Irish cheese and crackers, a bottle of Rioja left over from the tasting and 5 paper cups. We can’t wait to come back. 

While we are off on our Durvillea journey Simon is in Dublin doing a tasting at the Blackrock O’Briens store. Last night we all attended another tasting at the Westbury Hotel for about 100 O’Briens loyal customers. It was the first time the girls heard their dear old dad talk formally about the wines to an audience.  Tomorrow it is a winemaker’s lunch at the Royal Irish Yacht Club and then Simon is presenting a masterclass at the Good Food Show.

Tomorrow is our last day in Dublin. We head of in separate directions on Saturday. Meg and Henry head off to Liverpool and London. Arabella, Libby, Simon and I are off to Paris for the weekend. On Monday Simon is off to Perth to meet Jason and fly the Astrolabe flag for the first time in Western Australia. The girls and I are meeting up in London and I will spend a couple of days in the trade, visiting customers.

Dublin is such a fantastic market for us.  O’Briens  import us into Ireland and distribute us through their 28 stores and now Durvillea through the wholesale division. They are terrific stores and a wonderful family based company. We enjoy working with them all. Coming here is like visiting old friends and we have grown very fond of the city of Dublin.

-          Jane.