Great Southern

I can’t believe I didn’t include this gem in my last post – me stomping the Pinot!

And a tribute to the new cellar door (tasting room):

My job ended abruptly after the picking was finished and all the crushing gear was cleaned, as all there was left to do was barrel work and wait for a very extended maceration of the top cabernets.  Our vintage party involved morning champagne, super golf (an easy version of golf with lighter clubs with larger faces and larger but lighter golf balls that were brightly colored so they were easier to find even though I still managed to lose one), 

a long-table lunch down by the Margaret river, and then a sort of continuation of the celebration at Britta’s lovely house.  The day involved some delicious wines including a Hafner Chardonnay, which immensely impressed the very hard to impress Watsons (well done Hafners!), a Spottswoode Cabernet (always well received), Chateaux Margaux, Hill of Grace, many other delicious wines, and ended with a 1927 Port:

With my free time the following week I decided to take off for a couple days and go camping in the Great Southern region.  The drive was beautiful (good thing because it was very long), I visited a couple good wineries (they make a good Pinot, as it is cooler down south), and on the way back I stopped at the south-western tip of Australia, Cape Leeuwin, which has this lighthouse:

And is yet another point where two oceans meet, this time the Southern and the Indian.  I swam in both that day J