Hunter Valley Wine Region

aaaahhhh wine at last!  Me thinks could be the best part of the trip tasting great aussie wines and being driven around to do so!  whats not to love!

Okay so we left Port M around midday and headed for the Pacific Hwy once more (embarking on an almost 3 hour drive).    Andrew at Cedro restaurant suggested we take the inland route "The Buckets Way" -- yes this isthe name of the "highway".     So, we drive an hour south of Port and at Taree head west on the Buckets Way.    Good call.   this is a superb drive through rural cattle pasture and farmland not to mention mountain range after mountain range.  Again with the curvy windy roads but not really too too bad.   About an hour in we come across a town of Gloucester which is a very small agricultural town population 2600.   It literally could be enfield which is surrounded by farmland and a center of commerce and actually a lively downtown, several pubs, "hotels" (pubs), grocery, cafes and stores.   It seems to be a little artsy haven with a couple art shops so probably an influx of Sidney Siders and Melbourne ites have descended as artists and pepped up the little town.     It was very serendipitous to stumble into this town so we walked the length of the downtown (about 5 or so blocks) and settled on a bit of curry chicken & rice takeaway.
moving back into the car we head next for the town of dongog and drive sw on rt 31.   Have you heard of the road less travelled?  This is the road much much less travelled and the only traffic were watching the cows queue up on the side of the road.  It was wonderful!  A great ride and remember Keep Left! (although it really doesn't matter when no other traffic)

Arriving at our inn THE TABLE GUESTHOUSE was like manna from heaven.  What a beautiful place.  Jude (wife partner of Phil) came out to greet us and then said there was a problem, my wotif.com reservation said for wednesday.  And naturally I said well of course it is.     Slight Problem:  today was Tuesday!    Remember on the flight over I said I lost a day in travel?  Well I got it back today.     Somehow in my mind I allocated 2 nights on the road before Hunter Valley and originally we were leaving byron monday.   I booked byron correct and sydney correct but somehow the two nights on the road were sun nite and mon nite.     Panic sets in but Jude was great and said in Aussie fashion "no worries mate" we have availability so you want to stay all 3 days?  YES!  
If you come to Aussie or plan on it and come to hUnter valley (which I highly recommend) stay at this place!!! No exceptions.  it is a small 5 room guest house with the most amazing breakfast.   The brekkie special:  poached egg with bacon and avocado on whole wheat toast.     we had dinner here one night that Phil is the chef for which was lambsicles and asparagus and taters,  starter was a creamed cauliflower soup with gorgonzola (YUM!!) and dessert a bit of pannacotta with fruit topping.  It was heavenly.   come and stay here you will be amazed.  Jude & Phil spent 5 years living in mozambique and she acquired lots and lots of african artifacts and furnishings, came back to Oz bought this B&B and had a place to furnish the african items.  We are in the Elephant room..

Wine tasting the next day by TWO FAT BLOAKES tour company -- tripadvisor recommended and recommended by Jude.   Pick up at 9 and we visited with two other couples 5 wineries (Calais, Mistletoe, Peterson, and others).  Plus a chocolate and wine pairing at the Hudson Valley Gardens,  a cheese tasting at HV cheese, and an olive/olive oil tasting.  Plus, an antipasto lunch and wine outside Peterson winery up on the hill under a tree with our new mates -- the other couples -- Peter & Danielle from Sydney, Mark & Deb from Melbourne and Graham our host and driver.      The melbourne couple we stayed on at the HV beer company after our beer tasting and had another 2 jugs of beer with them.  They invited us to their house in Melbourne next monday night so that will be fun.  

The beer tasting was great.   make a great craft beer (pale ales, wheat bier, boch, etc) and were in the midst of an experiment of "wine & Beer" mix.   This I must say was terrible just tasted like beer and wine poured together.  But one of their seasonal beers (not avail now) was an oyster beer which they claim gets rave reviews.  Hmm.  oysters yumm!  beer yumm!  together ???? not sure about that

Next day Hunter valley...we are staying here forever..Jude & Phil a delight and know how to feed us and keep us happy!!   But now off to Hunter Valley Gardens which once again is exquisite. THey have this separated by garden type: formal garden, grandma's rose garden with great sculpture of a grandmother looking over her grandkids, oriental garden, japanese garden and a "storybook" garden.   Great pics of this they take fairytales and kids stories and create gardens around the sculptures. For example, Jack and jill has two figures on a sloping hill like they are rolling down and up top a well with the kids dipping the bucket in.  THey have Alice's Mad Hatters tea party with tweedle dee and dum.  At each installationthey have a sculpture of an open fairy tale book with the highlights of each story.   It is really well done and wait to you see the pics.

had a nice lunch at Country Cafe at the little "shops" area and their tagline is "Food like no udder".   Finally had regular burgers with turkish bread was pretty killer and had been jonesing a burger.    Nice verdelho from up the road...

onward drove back to Calais vineyard and purchased a couple bottles for the road...some chambercid (red) and some verdelho and voignier.   THis was our fave vineyard we went to.

spent the rest of day drove into the little town of Maitland a cute little town and interesting architecture (very british in these parts with lots of wrought iron). Had our first venture into a Woolworth's grocery store and saw the reference to McDOnalds on a billboard "Macca's".   THe aussies shorten all their words they have a shortened version of everything --- salvation army is "salvo"...., breakfast is "brekkie"

easy night at the table guesthouse and woke late ish (okay 8am) another fine brekkie.   venture the 2-3 hour drive to sydney...