Last Saturday we took a tour of the Hunter Valley arranged by a group at AGSM (Australian School of Management at the University of New South Whales- that's where G is doing his quarter abroad) I have to admit that I was pretty excited to get out and start meeting people. Truthfully, so far we Americans have been mostly keeping to ourselves -- it's time to start hanging with others. I was also excited because it was a wine tasting trip and we all know I like wine tasting.
The Hunter Valley is the place to go for Shiraz. Shiraz, Shiraz everywhere. In the white department, you're looking at Semillon and some Verdehlo. I still consider myself a fledgling in the world of wines, even after a few years of doing tastings and trying to get a better understanding of them. It's one of those cases where the more I learn, the more I realize I don't know. I certainly have not yet developed a very strong palate when it comes to whites. Therefore, I will direct you all to this very informative site I've been reading called Wine Divas for descriptions on the varietals. It's also part laziness -- why do work someone else has already done better.
To be honest, I think some other wine regions I've visited are prettier. You might think that I'm just being partial to California; however, I also loved the landscape of the wineries our friend Kuba took us to visit in Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley of BC, as well as the little we had a chance to see of Ensenada in Mexico. It's really the hills that I'm partial too. All three of these areas have the added benefit of many majestic hills and mountains to adorn the horizon, whereas, what we saw of the Hunter Valley was a little more flat. At least this was the case near Pokolbin, the town the wineries we visited were in.
All of that said, comparing the landscapes of various wine countries seems a little like comparing gemstones. They're obviously all beautiful and choosing between them comes down to personal taste and a bit of nitpicking. There's really is not much to complain about - you are drinking wine after all. Here you have the added benefit of possibly seeing some wild kangaroos along the way. You certainly don't get to see those guys hopping around the Nappa Valley.
Tangent ---On the subject kangaroo sightings - On the drive up, Kate decided it would be fun to make a game out of who could spot the first wild kangaroo during our stay in Australia. Five dollars to the winner. Not even 5 minutes went by before G piped up with "Found one!" (I caught a slight glimpse as well before we moved too far out of view.) She begrudgingly conceited the loss only once we saw another mob in a field on the return trip home.
We stopped into four wineries in total on this trip. Our first stop was at Hermitage Road Cellars at the Hunter Resort. This resort offers a Wine School program and an abbreviated presentation was set up for our group. The video actually gave a really good step-by-step guide on how wine is made without getting too drawn out and boring.
After that we got to the wine tasting. Our guide also gave us some wonderful tips on proper slurping techniques for maximum flavor. Their shop offers wines from several small winemakers and there was definitely some decent stuff there. I later ended up wishing we had purchased more at this stop, but as the case maybe, we only ended up purchasing one bottle 2007 Two of a kind Shiraz from Thomas Wines. This is made with grapes from the Hunter Valley and McLaren Vale. It has nice tannins with dark fruits and spicy notes. I also got just a hint of smoke and thought it had a nice mouthfeel.
AHA! Caught Red-handed!
A particularly nice feature about this spot is that if you're tired of wines, they also have a brewery onsite. Walk out the door of the wine shop and right into the Bluetongue Brewery and cafe. Kate got their tasting paddle and was nice enough to share.
Our second winery was the McGuigan Cellars, which struck me as bigger operation. I have to say that neither G nor I were all that taken with much here, however, if you like dessert wines there were a couple of interesting things to try. Their Late Picked Traminer is an attempt to simulate ice wines you find in Germany and Canada. They certainly don't get the same frigid temperatures here, so they try to approximate the sweetness by allowing the grapes to remain on the vine as long as possible to wrack up sugar content. They also have a Botrytis Semillon we would have liked to try but we ran out of time.
Stop number three was Hope Estate, which was a very pretty property. Our guide for this tasting, Ben, gave a good presentation and seemed pretty knowledgeable about the wines offered, despite being really young. We also had better luck finding stuff we liked here. We walked away with two more bottles of Shiraz. I liked the 2006 "The Ripper" Shiraz for its dark berry and chocolate notes. G was more partial to the 2007 Hunter Valley Shiraz, which was more dry with earthy and pepper flavors. If I recall correctly, I also kind of liked the 2007 Merlot, and their 2007 Late Picked Verdelho was nice, less-sweet dessert wine. Of all the wineries we went to, Hope Estate Wines should be the easiest to find in the US.
Our final winery was at Kevin Sobels Winery. To be perfectly honest, my palate was so shot by the time we tried their wines that I really don't trust it at all. G, however, seemed confident enough to pick up one more shiraz for the collection - their 2005. 'Dry' is all the description my mouth could give me by this point. I'll be interested to see what it tastes like when we open it.
Somehow, in between all the wine tastings, there was time to feed lots of other delicious vices. We stopped at a chocolate shop and for olive and condiment tastings and yet another boutique shop.
A candy buying stop at the Pokolbin Chocolate Company. This is Michelle -- she put the trip together for everyone.
We even did a cheese tasting at a place named the Smelly Cheese Shop. Since I'm of the smellier-the-better school of cheese lovers, I had extremely high hopes for this tasting. Unfortunately, we were given mostly fresh cheeses. Don't get me wrong, I love fresh cheeses too, but I was mislead the name.
Luckily, throughout the store there were samples and we were able to try a few interesting blues. MMMM. We of course walked away with one of those as well. This place is huge and has a wide variety of deli options, sandwiches, salads, and pies. G and I had some delicious sandwiches with parma ham and gouda for lunch. One word of caution though, while delicious, these sandwiches are assembled in the most awkward way. All the tasty components were falling out the sides. A knife and fork might make things easier.
By the time everyone piled back in the bus and headed for home, all of this food and drink had left everyone wavering back and forth between drowsiness and total loopiness. Ultimately, the loopy took it upon themselves to rouse the drowsy, and things devolved into loud singing and joking all the way home. Hopefully, we'll get a chance to get to know this troop around the world better -- the AGSM-ers appear to be quite a cast of characters.
This crew is featured in G's slideshow:
The spoils of our trip.
Note: A quick google search will lead you to many, many options for touring the Hunter Valley. Our tour was organized through Sydney Wilderness Tours, I believe.
For more info, check out the Hunter Valley Wine Country Tourist info site. For additional info on Australian varietals beyond Shiraz, check out VinoDiversity.
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