We spent a day touring some wineries in the Margaret River region of Western Australia. For this blog post, I'll take you along on our tour, complete with my pictures of each place. The picture to the right is obviously of some grapes at one of the wineries. It was nice to tour wineries when there was actually something on the vines, as I toured the Yarra Valley region in autumn when the vines were withered and bare!
Our first stop was Cullen Wines. They are known for their organic vineyard and biodynamic agricultural processes. After our wine tasting, we had some bread with delicious dips and olive oil. This was a cute little place with great wine and food; it ended up being one of our favorites of the day.
Next we headed nearby Vasse Felix. This place had several strange sculptures on its grounds. The main building was very pretty, and we enjoyed their wine as well.
I'm giving a thumbs down to the Margaret River Chocolate Company. Their "tastings" consisted of picking out a few of what were basically chocolate chips from a bowl. They had white chocolate and dark chocolate, but no milk chocolate was out on the day we were there. Also, they usually have chocolatiers you can watch making treats, but there were none of those working on this day. Highly disappointing (though my mouth is full of white chocolate chips in the picture!).
We were now in the heart of the Margaret River area, and we headed to Cape Mentelle. By this point, I guess the wine and chocolate had made Zack tired, because he took a nap in the car for a little while before we went inside. I didn't mind; I read a book on the swing and enjoyed the quiet winery.
Our next stop was the extremely impressive Voyager Estate. The grounds of this place were amazing! If you think Domaine Chandon in the Yarra Valley region is pretty, it's got nothing on this place.
This place has the second largest Australian flag in the country (the biggest is in Canberra). The grounds are flawless with perfectly manicured hedges and expansive green lawns.
Here's a picture of me ringing the bell out front. It was quite loud, so this shot shows me running away!
We enjoyed walking around the rose gardens and choosing our favorite (this was mine). There were also rose bushes at the end of each row of vines. This was definitely our other favorite winery for the day.
We tried to go to Leeuwin Estate, but they hold a yearly concert which happened to fall on the weekend we were there, so the line of cars to even get on the grounds was insane. We decided to skip it and instead headed to the Margaret River Cheese Company before it closed. After a delicious tasting, we purchased a bag containing crackers and little portions of some of their cheeses. This made for a great snack over the next few days-I love cheese!
The Margaret River wine region was beautiful, and touring it was a relaxing and delicious way to spend a day in Western Australia.
Yesterday I got a nice surprise in the mail...a package from my friend Jennifer. She sent me all sorts of American chocolate and treats! And since Zack is currently in the US for work training and can therefore buy his own treats, I don't have to share. Thanks Jennifer!
My mom, dad, aunt, and uncle are back in town after their amazing time in New Zealand. Today I took them to Pie Face for lunch, one of my favorite Australian chain restaurants where you can get sweet and savoury pies of all types. I got my usual chunky steak pie with mashed potatoes and gravy on top. Now, these pies are nowhere near as good as the ones Zack and I found the other day at a place a short walk from our house called Pure Pie (which we highly recommend-it's in Port Melbourne), but Pie Face has several locations in the city and is a great place to take tourists for a quick, easy lunch.
To continue our touristy expedition, we went souvenir shopping, and my Aunt Kathy got some awesome purple Uggs (her favorite color!). Then we headed to Chokolait, a chocolate place I've read about and been wanting to try for awhile now. The picture below is of the mud cake, which was delicious, but the chocolate pavlova was incredible. I'm going to have to go back for another one of those! Tonight we're dining at/on the Tramcar Restaurant, so they'll be a blog entry about that coming soon. Off to get ready...
After our awesome swim with the dolphins on Sunday morning, we drove North toward Picton. A couple of hours later, we arrived in the Marlborough wine region for an afternoon of wine tasting. This area is world renowned for its wine, especially the Sauvignon Blanc variety. Our first winery stop was Cloudy Bay (the cellar door is pictured here), where we enjoyed sitting in the sunshine for awhile after our tasting. 
On Monday, November 14, my family spent their final morning in Sydney doing whatever they wanted. Morgan and I slept, my mom and dad packed and rested, and Justin and Cindy explored the New South Wales Art Gallery. Then we headed to the airport for that famed Tiger Airways flight mentioned in yesterday's post. After getting to Melbourne two hours later than planned, we changed our itinerary a bit and headed to Lygon Street for dinner. It's kind of like the "Little Italy" of Melbourne with several Italian restaurants in a row. As you walk by them, people out front offer you free things to lure you in to their place. We chose one that gave us free drinks, garlic bread, and bruschetta. The pasta was tasty, and we followed it up with desserts at Koko Black. I've always heard that the hot chocolate there was delicious, and it definitely lived up to the hype. Yum! Tomorrow I start posting about our trip down the Great Ocean Road. Until then...
The Chocolate Rush Festival took place in the Docklands this weekend, and I was intrigued. A whole festival dedicated to chocolate? Surely this must be heaven. So yesterday while Zack was out mountain biking, I went, expecting to stuff myself silly with all forms of chocolate. This was, unfortunately, not what happened. Instead, this lame "festival" consisted of paying an outrageous entry fee to walk around what looked like an abandoned warehouse with about fifteen "booths" run by various chocolatiers selling their wares. That's right...you had to PAY to eat chocolate...after already paying the entry fee! Argh! Yes, there were a few samples, but they were teeny tiny morsels. One booth selling chocolate bars did have some plates with chunks of chocolate, so I "happened" to walk by them about six times trying to get my money's worth!
I did give in and buy myself a passionfruit hot chocolate (because it sounded too interesting to pass up-yes it was good) and got a couple of macaroons to share with Zack (pistachio and raspberry), but that was it. There was a cooking demonstration going on (and they handed out recipes), and the chocolate sculptures on display were kind of neat, but otherwise, it was a total waste of time. Oh well. I'm just glad I didn't drag Zack there with me. And now I can say I've been and can warn others not to go. I could have just gone to Max Brenner, spent my entry fee there, and been sick with chocolatey goodness!
