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Last week, Cyclone Gabrielle ripped through the North Island and left a trail of destruction in its wake. Eleven people were killed, dozens more were injured and around 10,000 were left homeless, according to early estimates. Prime minister Chris Hipkins called it the country’s ‘biggest natural disaster’ of the 21st century, and damages are estimated at NZ$13bn (£6.7 bn). Hawke’s Bay and Gisborne are New Zealand’s second and third largest wine producing regions respectively, yielding a combined ...

An electronic dart was tossed at us recently by Decanter reader Tim Frances from Kent. It landed on the screen of our magazine editor Amy Wislocki; Amy lobbed it across the virtual room to me, suggesting a column-length reply. ‘Here’s a poser,’ Tim began. ‘How do your experts grade a wine that they find intellectually well made, but that they truly madly deeply dislike? I’ve tasted wines I can admire dispassionately, but would stab my feet with forks rather than drink them. Must be a conundrum f ...

According to lifestyle and happiness guru Gretchen Rubin, you ‘bring your own weather to a picnic’. Ms Rubin, I’d suggest, has never shivered under a tree watching raindrops turn her fish-paste sandwich to mush because the weather forecast was wrong. There are, it’s safe to say, picnics and Picnics. It’s a term that takes in everything from a rubber baguette in a French ‘Aire’ off the Autoroute du Soleil to a four-course spread while listening to opera at Glyndebourne. What’s definitely true is ...