Idyllic weekend leaves everyone feeling rose

Warm weather plus wine, roses and jazz added up to a perfect Sunday afternoon for connoisseurs from Canberra and the surrounding region.

The two-day Wine, Roses & All That Jazz Festival ended yesterday.

Wineries in and around the capital, including those of Bungendore, Murrumbateman and Lake George, entertained local and interstate guests who sampled the best of their cellars and kitchens.

More than 400 people visited the Pialligo Estate Winery and Cafe at the weekend, enjoying a good drop of wine, as well as the jazz of trio Alopi and the Palermo Express.

In their previous lives, owners Sally Milner and John Nutt were a book publisher and a solicitor respectively. They now laugh that they have become ''peasants'' owning a vineyard is tough physical work.

Had they always been interested in viticulture? ''No. We just thought we could do it because we drank a lot,'' Mrs Milner said.

The festival, a celebration of the start of spring, brought together things that were complementary.

''Wine and jazz go together on a lazy Sunday afternoon,'' she said. The roses were traditional vineyards used to grow them to check for diseases in the area.

The area certainly looks disease-free it is blooming and looks green and lush.

The couple do not make the wine, an off-site winemaker produces it for them.

Their winery's riesling recently won a silver medal in the National Riesling Challenge, and the winery is doing well. It, like other wineries, has recovered from the wine glut of recent years.

Canberra, like the wines it produced, had its own distinct character, Ms Milner said. If Canberra were a wine, it would be a ''refined, flavoursome wine, a fine shiraz''.

Pialligo couple Lindy and Bob Ross, who were at the winery for the festival, thought it was a good way to promote Canberra's wines in the region. ''It's really blooming at the moment,'' Mr Ross said.

Mrs Ross said if Canberra were a wine, it would be a champagne.

''It's always got a bubble and a fizz to it.''