Wine club help in Poole, England

Here is the situation. My Daughter and Son in Law are now in Poole, England for the next 2 years. Rob has been transfered with the Coast Guard to help teach at the Lifeboat Scool. Rob has never been into wine and Kris use to be slightly into it.(For those of you that know me this is probably a shock.) Now there is a whole new seen and wines that they need to learn about. Kris sent me a wine web site that they can purchase from and with the help of 2 friends that are very into French wines we were able to give them some good wines to start with. I would really like to help them get with a wine group that would really help to fine tune their pallets. So if anyone can help please let me know.

Cheers,

Jodene
The UK wine pages forum often organise offlines, but I don't recall any in Poole, though when I searched for Dorset (county) four names came back
Dave Sansom
Mark Carrington
Mike Thompson
Stuart Knight
Mark's a regular poster so might be of some help. Worth posting a general message there, or if you prefer I'd be happy to do this for you (you can read the posts/replies without registering)
The site is http://www.wine-pages.com/cgi-bin2/ulti ... =forum;f=1

Ordering wines over the internet is pretty easy in UK (apart from the usual neanderthal couriers ). Some good UK merchants with decent websites and well chosen selections
http://www.raeburnfinewines.com (Edinburgh)
http://www.nywines.co.uk (Cambridge)
http://www.thecellardoor.co.uk (Hampshire - driveable from Poole)
http://www.ahadleigh-wine.co.uk (Southampton - also driveable)
http://www.jeroboams.co.uk (London)
http://www.lsfinewines.co.uk (Great Languedoc selection)
http://www.majestic.co.uk (now probably best of the chains - some great value aged german rieslings in recent months).

Just a small selection of a large range of excellent independant wine merchants.

As you say, the general selection is wide (though the supermarkets still manage to make everything taste like cordial), which with a trend to regional specialisation via the internet means there is a vast array of interesting wine to get hold of.

Let me know if you would like me to post a message on the UK wine pages forum.

Hope they have a great time down there. Whilst they're in that area, two good tourist areas along the coast. Going east, Lulworth Cove has the most amazing Geology and is very beautiful. Going west, Cornwall and it's coastal walks are stunning.

regards

Ian

Way to go Ian from Norwich!! You seem to be on the ball as always. Agree, get on the UK Wine Forum, easy to register, and post some questions. You will get lots of help, advice, jokes (sick),etc. A few of us here are over there too, including Otto, Bob Ross. We are a serious lot here, sort of, cannot always relate to those guys over the pond!!!!

BTW remember Poole from my yachting and birding days in the UK.

Bob
Thankyou I'm suitably blushing!
UK humour is a difficult thing to pin down. I don't know if you get Little Britain over in Canada, but I could imagine it would seem more than bizarre. I do hope you never got League of Gentlemen as I don't know if I could even start to explain it.
I always enjoy seeing the cross-fertilisation of interests between the various fora, as it helps broaden our horizons (and not just in a vinous sense). I particularly appreciate the adventurous culinary spirit here and am learning to smell the flowers less often in favour of cooking them! I also appreciate the tone of this forum (more friendly and helpful than serious perhaps? Definitely a pleasant place to hang out).
kind regards
Ian

Hi Jody!

Boy (or girl I should say) it has been a long time since Ihave seen your name on the forum, and it is glad I am to see it now. The last time I heard your daughter was on the east coast...Virginia or North Carolina IIRC. Of course from here in Kentucky I know from nothing about wine clubs etc in Great Britain, but I see that you have already had some good input. I would hope that Peter May would chime in too as he is a brit and a noted wine fellow as well. Good to see you girl!

Good point Bob H.........hello Peter May!! I`ll go over to the UK forum.

This page has the most comprehensive list of wine tasting clubs - http://www.wineontheweb.co.uk/wineclubs/wineclubs.html but I can't see Poole or Bournemouth listed

Suggest the find the nearest good wine shop and asking them about local tasting clubs, and check the 'whats on' column in the local newspaper. All else fails, they can start one themselves.

There seems to be a number of independent wine merchants in Poole, plus a branch of Oddbins so it isn't necessary to buy by the case via the web, plus there are several branches of Threshers who currently have a 40% off offer on French wines when you buy 6.

Poole wine shops - http://www.welcometopoole.co.uk/biztype/offlicences.htm
Bournemouth wine shops -
http://www.city-visitor.com/bournemouth ... hants.html

Ian thank you for your input, I actually copied and pasted your response yesterday and sent to Krisy. She was very please to know that the Magestic site is a good one to order from as that is the site she had forwarded to me. She also was saying that they knew of an Ian over there that works for the RNLI that is into wines and wondered if it was the same Ian. Thank you again.

Thank you Peter, I was hoping that by posting you would also reply. Krisy is really appreciative of the help. Rob is away on business visiting the Life Boat Stations arround England and so she is doing a bunch os research before he returns to home Friday. I am sure that this information will really please her as she can go and check out Oddbins this week.

"There seems to be a number of independent wine merchants in Poole, plus a branch of Oddbins so it isn't necessary to buy by the case via the web, plus there are several branches of Threshers who currently have a 40% off offer on French wines when you buy 6."

Thank you again,

Jodene
Sadly I'm more likely to need the services of RNLI than be in them! I'm based in Norwich on the east coast of England, though I've done some work in nearby Bournemouth over the last year.
regards
Ian
p.s. Assure them that the weather we're getting at the moment is not indicative of the norm and enjoy it while it lasts

Ian,

Since Krisy lived on the north Oregon shore for about 15 years and recently Rob was last stationed pn the South Washington Coast at Westport, they are use to the type of weather that is in England. In fact they are both out running around in shorts just like back home, and loving it too. I am planning a trip over to visit them next year probably in September and we will have to get an offline for then.

Thank you again for all of your information.