Our car arrived at 10am, a beautifully restored 1958 Cadillac from Arizona. We hired it from Hunter Valley Cadillacs, owned by our driver Debbie and her husband. Such a great experience for a group of 4 friends and family to do - Certainly better than going on a large group tour and definitely better than having to have a designated driver!
We ventured to 4 vineyards, 2 before lunch and 2 after and that was plenty enough for a full day. Our first Vineyard was Thomas Allen, Moon Mountain, a 40 year old vineyard that had just opened locally about a year ago. It was just as I imagined; a lovely country villa with a veranda looking over the vineyard below.
The Gentleman John was very knowledgeable about the wines and wine tasting itself - I learnt about the different tastes and how the back of your tongue is for the tannins, the sides are for acids and the front is for sweet. I also learnt that when you are asked to taste a wine at a restaurant it isn't just to see if you like it but to check it isn't corked (if it is corked it apparently smells like wet carpet!). Freya and Dan purchased a few wines including the 6 for $60 unlabelled bottles of Shiraz, a red wine but surprisingly good chilled!
The next Vinyard was the Gundog Estate, named after the family Gundog. By this time we were feeling a little peckish so ordered a cheese platter to go with our wines. I bought a couple of lovely sweet wines from The Gundog (I'm a big fan of the sweet!) an off dry semillion and a desert muscat that tasted just like Christmas pudding in a bottle! Turns out that the owner of the vineyard knew the famous artists Gillie and Marc Schattner who are known for their half animal half human design and had made a couple of statues for the vineyard!
The vineyard visits take about an hour each so you may be thinking how are we not hammered by that stage? Well the vineyard wine tastings aren't aimed at getting you drunk, but simply to try different wines, discover your favourites and purchase a couple of bottles. There are also little buckets to take advantage of if you don't like a particular wine, you don't have to drink it! It's not compulsory!!
We had a quick bite to eat at Potters Brewery where we enjoyed some sunshine on the picnic tables too.
After lunch we headed to Iron Gate Vineyard where we enjoyed some more picturesque views. I also learnt that the grape vines were sort of colour coded by rose bushes which signified which grapes were in the vine. Also, Roses are more susceptible to diseases that may harm the vines so may show signs of any issues before the vines are attacked.
Before I bought my 2014 Rose (named after the owner's Mother who emigrated from the UK to live with her son aged 93!) we had a quick tour of the machinery used to make the wines which was very interesting! Here we learnt the difference between French oak and American oak barrels - the French creates a more spicy cinnamon taste and the American more nutty.
Our final stop was Ernest Hill. We were greeted by Ross who was lovely and he showed us to our seats around a barrel before introducing his equally lovely colleague Lesley. Again full of knowledge, I learnt here that apparently it takes 3 tastes to really appreciate the flavour of the wine and clear the palate. They also had a whole menu of sweet wines! My favourite! I purchased a Luna Rouge, a very nice sweet rose.
This was certainly my favourite day of the holiday! Absolutely amazing, you HAVE to do this if you don't do anything else while you are visiting! Debbie dropped us back to where we were staying in the H Boutique Hotel. We had a 2 bed apartment which was gorgeous, very modern yet simple with 2 good size bedrooms, a large bathroom and open plan kitchen/living area leading out to a little patio overlooking a small lake. As we arrived home there were about 6 wild kangaroos just outside the back door having supper! A perfect way to end a perfect day!
Lexie
xxx
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