John Peters Says " Good Bye " To The Washington D.C. Wine Business After Many Glorious Years Starting With Father & Son At The Wide World Of Wines

Last night John Peters was at Cleveland Park Wines & Spirits ( 3423 Connecticut Avenue N.W. Washington D.C. 2008 sales@clevelandparkwine.com www.clevelandparkwine.com Tel : 202-363-4265 ) doing his last official wine-starting for our Cleveland Park customers. Thanks John, as usual it was a real treat to have you taste wines with so many of our favorite customers.

These are John's last few days with LVDH imports selling fine French, Italian, Chilean and California wines just to name a few of the more prominent areas in the LVDH portfolio. Oh, I left out Australia, sorry!

John is a lovable, smiling and very easy person to be around. He always comes in with a swagger and a lot of movement and flow, hands sweep, he sometimes takes a graceful bow, he's usually announcing something and smiling broadly. He wants to please and be liked, definitely wants to be noticed.

Last night was no exception as he walked backwards into the store surveying our domain and where he would be tasting for the next two hours. I see his eyes wandering quickly over the expanse of our store and my eyes and brain register his thoughts as he beats me to the punch. " How am I supposed to be able to compete with these two babes ? "

John is of course referring to Ro doing her tasting of both the GLENLIVET single malt scotches ( years 12 and 15 ) and Renee doing her tasting of four MAGIC HAT beers.

I'm thinking that " ladies " might have been a more appropriate name as another lady shopper was off to our side in the French/Italian section and could easily hear what was being said. I decided to let it go.

We decided to have John taste a " new " $10 white Bordeaux as well as a 2006 " new " red Bordeaux. They both showed really well and for the price were close to " steals " in today's market of really expensive wines. I will include their names, etcetera once I get to the store. It is Saturday morning, 9:56 AM here at home in northern Virginia ( December 20th, 2008 ) just before I get ready to go to work and sell lots of wines for this holiday season!

To spice things up we added a delicious " new " Chilean 85% Carmenere/ 15% Merlot blend. We have not used it in quite some time but we desperately needed some Carmenere in our store. What clinched it was the other day I stumbled over the pictures I took years ago ( was it late 2005 or 2006? I will have to check this out further ) of the two beautiful ladies that came ( Marie Chassion, the  one from Brazil with the glasses, and the darker, brunette from the U.S. ) with John to present these excellent Chilean wines to Mike Martin and me. Funny, I took no pictures of John this day. Sorry!

Along with three other more recent pictures of John ( tasting among others the excellent white French Pacherenc du Vic Bihl southwest close to Spain dry wine ) here at the store tasting with our Cleveland Park customers I have downloaded the pictures of our first visit with the two ladies and their ESTAMPA Chilean wines. I will add much more about all of this in time.

But unfortunately I am now running out of time and want to post this before going to work. It's just the start, mind you.

Mike Martin and I spoke a few minutes with John before he left. We talked about his long history in the wine business starting with his father and brother Scott. John attributed his father's keen love of wine for fueling their fires and getting them equally interested/passionate about wine. Both John and Scott have remained in the wine business somehow over all these years.

Truth be told Mike and I did not really feel like last night we were really saying a final " bye bye " to John as we feel he will return. Don't get us wrong, we both want you to succeed John but we do not feel you will be able to stay away forever from the strong pull that wine has over you and the both of us! We'll see, time will tell.

We do wish you well and all the success in your new pursuits John. Let us know if there is anything that we can do for you. You are always welcome here at Cleveland Park. We appreciate all that you have done for us here : your professional, up-beat, contagious enthusiasm spirit and lovable, warm smile that just breaks out instantly all over your face and cannot but relax and make others smile at the minimum inwardly.

But off you go John! You have fifty people waiting at your home for your arrival! You've got a friend there cooking a big feast of Cajun food was it, spare ribs, something flavorful and tasty I remember. Have a great evening tonight with all your family and friends.

I'm off to see my son swim for his high school swim team and I cannot be late!

At the end of the tasting I asked John to sign our guest book which he did. We both walked out of the store together and gave each other a big hug and headed off in two different directions down/up Connecticut Avenue N.W. Washington D.C. ( our nation's capitol ).

Cheers and until I write more and add more pictures " be safe " and have a great holiday season 2008. TONY

I'm at the store and have the bottles before me now of what John sampled here last night : 1) the CHATEAU DU BARRAIL, Reserve 2007 white Bordeaux, $9.99 2) the CHATEAU DES LEOTINS 2006 red Bordeaux ON SALE for $8.99 3) the ESTAMPA Carmenere 85% / Merlot 15% , Chilean Colchagua Valley red , $11.99 ( we also have John's favorite ESTAMPA 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon 80% / Merlot 20% that we did not taste but have here now ). Cheers, TONY

P.S. John through LVDH Imports also represented some excellent California wineries. Here pictured at the start ( just added by me tonight, Sunday, December 21st, 2008 ) at home in northern Virginia at 10:55 PM are three pictures of the owner of IMAN winery. I loved her dry Pinot Noir rose and bought it immediately from John. More about that later. TONY

     I just spoke to John this Tuesday morning, just before noon, December 23rd, 2008 and he filled me in on his small but fun party of die-hard friends that came to celebrate the winter solstice with him and his family. They had a bonfire outside because they were outside. John said " " That's the key ". He was referring to the bonfire of course. His friend Brian Patterson made this duck confit and John just could not say enough about it as he rattled off all the ingredients at a mile a minute!

     Cheers John, I'm glad that it was a resounding success!    TONY