February 15 - McLaren Vale, Adelaide, South Australia

Today we docked at the port of Adelaide, capital of the state of South Australia. I booked an all-day tour to the McLaren Vale, one of the premier wine districts of Australia. Consequently I only saw Adelaide, the city, passing through.  The city is large, over 1250 sq. mi., in area and the McLaren Vale is technically part of Adelaide’s greater metropolitan area.  This city was the planned capital of the only freely settled state in Australia.  The others were originally settled by convicts who were transported here for their crimes.  The city today is home to the Australian Space Agency and has a number of defense and manufacturing companies based here.

The McLaren Vale (not valley as a couple of my new Aussie friends told me) is a world-famous wine-growing region.  It has a Mediterranean climate with warm days and short, cool nights and four distinct seasons which makes it ideal for growing grapes.  The summer months are generally dry and sunny and it rarely has either drought or frost.  As we drove into the area I was blown away by the beauty of the countryside.  There are rolling hills covered with vineyards interspersed with little groves of eucalyptus trees, Norfolk island pines and even some plane trees. Many of the vineyards had roses planted along the perimeter to add a splash of color (and to keep aphids and other pests off the vines).  It reminded me of the scenery in some parts of Tuscany or the Colchagua Valley in Chile that I went to 20 years ago. 

What a beautiful place!

Here not all the grapes are planted as vines.  Instead some are grown as bushes, something I don’t remember ever seeing before.  Here in Australia it’s about the equivalent of mid-August so the grapes were not yet ready for harvesting.  Our driver Justin evidently moonlights at a couple of vineyards and he showed us a small tractor that he drives between the rows of grapes to do some pruning.  At harvest time the grapes are handpicked.

A small tractor used between the rows of grapes

The first place we stopped was Petaringa Vineyards where we tasted several Bec Hardy wines. Bec is a sixth-generation member of a prominent Australian wine family and the first female producer from the family.  She was there when we pulled into the wine tasting building and I got to give her dog a schmooze (not that that’s relevant to anything). This region’s climate allows it to grow especially good dry red wines, so we tasted among others a shiraz and a cabernet. I’m not a wine connoisseur but they all tasted good to me.  

We moved on from there to the Farm Willunga, a beautiful place that in addition to producing shiraz wine also has an olive grove to produce  its own olive oil and it has a café and event space.  The grounds are lovely and I could see why many weddings are held there.  The lunch we had was delicious.  The first thing we were served was a plate with two types of olive oil, a few kalamata olives grown there, some good Italian bread and some dukkah. I had no idea what dukkah was, but I bought a couple of jars of it because it tasted good.  It is a blend of ground almonds, pistachios, sesame seeds, a couple of different kinds of peppercorns and fennel seeds.  We dipped the bread in the olive oil and then dabbed that into the dukkah. It was very tasty!  Next I had a plate of homemade fettucine with sauce made from only ingredients grown at the farm.  It was chunky with tomatoes, olives, pieces of garlic and onion, and some fennel slices.  I took a photo of the first dish but forgot to take one of the pasta.  Trust me; it was great.  With our meal we got some of the farm’s shiraz which also tasted good.  The ambiance wasn’t bad either.

Next we went to the Leconfield & Richard  Hamilton winery.  The setting here was gorgeous too, but by that time I was more in the mood for a siesta than a wine tasting.  I used the little buckets that are on the table that you can empty your splash of wine into after having a sip.  If I hadn’t I probably wouldn’t have known where I was, let alone what I was drinking.  All of the wines tasted good but my favorite was probably the one with lunch and I guess that makes sense.  I had it in a lovely place with some really good food.

When we left Hamilton’s we drove to one final place, the d’Arenberg Cube just to look at the building.  It’s a winery built by the 4th generation of a prominent McLaren Vale wine family and the building is unlike anything I’ve ever seen.  According to our guide Peter the owner is a “little eccentric.”  As you can see from the photos the building is a series of black and white cubes stacked kind of haphazardly on each other.  Some of the windows have photos of Salvador Dali on them and outside there are two very large Dali bronze sculptures.  Along the road there are other less dramatic but just as avant-garde sculptures.  Apparently people come just to look at the building and I can see why.

From the Cube we headed back to Adelaide and the ship. Along the way we drove past some of the city’s beautiful beaches, many of which are protected by reefs so there’s not a lot of wave action.  Unlike many of our beach towns there aren’t lots of high-rise hotels along the waterfront. Instead there are lots of two- and three-story homes that must cost a bundle of money.

While I didn’t get to see downtown Adelaide which does have lots of tall buildings as befits the fifth most populous city in Australia, what I did see was very interesting and attractive.  One thing I ought to mention is that so far every place I’ve been to here has been very clean.  I haven’t seen lots of litter along the highways or trash on the streets.  They must be doing something right here.