on the finer side of life
If you’re into wines, you’ll know that Australia makes some real fine wine, so what better else to get the taste of the best than going straight to the source?
ah koo rented a van for us all (that’s me, korg, mom, dad and ah ee) to go down to Hunter Valley, a little after Cessnock. It’s about 3 hours drive from Sydney, but the view sure is something. Well, maybe not so much on the highway, more to when you’re driving through Cessnock.
Since there wasn’t much fuel left in the tank ah koo decided to stop by a gas station at a place called Mooney Mooney to at least get enough fuel to reach the next station to fill up fully. Fancy that. And it looks like a really small community there, everything’s within a few kilometers. I say that cause there are signs practically pointing everywhere going everywhere, like the school, housing as well as the workers’ association. A short drive later (I think another half hour later), we arrived at another gas station where the van could be fed its fuel.
It was also at this gas station at I think Mt White (well that’s one thing great about Sydney’s mobile service – my bro bought an Optus prepaid, on Nokia phones it even shows you where you are.. anyway, this station’s either located a little before or after Mt White) where I had my first meal of McDonalds.
Now why is it such a big deal?
Cause it tastes different, and you should see the ‘health menu’ they have, it’s quite extensive. The packaging is different, and on each box/wrapper they state the nutrition contents. Seriousness. They have a ‘deli choices’ section where you get salads, wraps and sandwiches with stuff like Chicken Caesar and Avocado Chicken. Avocado is a favourite among the more health-conscious here since maybe it’s more easily available. It doesn’t taste too bad, kinda like eating a mix of cucumbers and sour cream. Their apple pie proudly boasts the use of the freshest Granny Smith apples, and whoever she is I’m sure Granny Smith would be proud. hahah. XD
Cessnock is like a really small town (maybe something like a mini Ipoh) and the scenery is a world apart from the city. Where trees are abundant in Cessnock, it’s scarce to be seen in Sydney, their fields of green stretching for kilometers (at least as far as the eye can see) with the occasional farm house in the middle of it all, and the animals! Mainly cows and horses, but for someone who doesn’t see those in real life (In the flesh – I don’t mean on the plate – I’ve seen cows, I’ve seen chickens, but I’ve never seen horsies! They look so pretty!) it was great to see some! “Cow, cow, cow!” And not just one or two, but maybe an entire herd of 20 or more at once~ whoaaahhh! =D
Their fire alarm system (well the one I saw at the information centre anyway) is pretty neat too, I’ve never seen an electronic one which tells you where the fire is and you have to press some buttons to do some funky stuff, I don’t know what.
Maybe the most amusing signboard I’ve seen in Cessnock reads: “Chock poo = $1.50 per bag.” I was just wondering, “What the heck is that?” to which ah ee answered, “Oh, that’s chicken shit. Used as fertilizer, y’know?”
blink blink.
Why didn’t I think of it? blah. XP
Reached the Wyndham Estate winery. It boasts some few kilometers of the finest grapes grown for wines, like Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay and erm, some others which I don’t remember. The first two are the easiest to remember, since it’s the more popular ones. Since it’s spring though, the grapes aren’t ripe yet, they don’t harvest it until end of the year or something (I wasn’t exactly paying attention to the lady who was narrating) Their trophy room is… wow. @_@ The walls are lined with all the certificates and awards the winery has won. Wait, not only the walls, but the ceiling too! I suppose they couldn’t line the floors with it cause it would be pretty much insulting to step all over them. XP I wonder why I state the obvious.
But that was only a small part of the visit, the main fun of going to the winery is, of course, the wine tasting! XDXDXD The attendant (I think her name was Wendy, she’s really really nice~) let us sample quite a bit.. a white wine (Chardonnay), 2 red wines (Shiraz & Cabernet Sauvignon), a port (complemented with a small bar of dark chocolate.. I definitely enjoyed this one – I never knew dark chocolate could taste so good with port, Must remember this XD), the dessert wine (which was super-sweet and the most grapey-tasting, I like) and their regional selection of red wine (which cannot be bought anywhere outside since it’s limited)… fuuh… I think it’s probably the most I’ve drunk in a sitting. I didn’t finish all (it was like a glass of each! @_____@), I think I finished the white, the port and the dessert wine, the red wines I had a little bit, about a sixth of the glass (probably a few sips at best, I don’t really like red wine, white is more my flavour.) So a memo to guys who want to buy me wine, don’t buy me red wine. But if you do, it’s alright, I’ll drink too. X3
I bet the funnest part about working in a winery is that because your customers can easily get really drunk due to the numerous wines they’ve ‘sampled’, they usually buy quite abit of it back, which was what I expect happened in our case. Let’s see, mom bought a bottle of red wine, the regional selection wine, the dessert wine, the white wine, and a gift pack for dad. Well it’s pretty reasonable actually, 4 small bottles for about $12. For ah koo she bought a red wine and the gift pack for his girlfriend, and for ah ee she bought a bottle of white wine. Don’t ask me how much it cost, I don’t know.
That was the only winery we visited; I bet my mom couldn’t walk a straight line after that. Anyway we visited the best, so we could drop the rest. X3 I bet the most of us slept on the ride back.
a note on Optus: The packaging looks alot like Digi’s, and Optus is to Australia what Maxis is to Malaysia. Just my 2 cents.
