May 25, 2014 To Barossa

Today is the day to hit the road for the Barossa Wine country but first we find our ladies know this area is also known as the mining country for Opals. Opals apparently appeal to our ladies and it just so happens our guide Jane knows just the call to make and boom, we head to the big beautiful home part of Adelaide to visit John and Sophia.

Just so happens John headed to the mines in 1964 and has been quite successful in mining Opals and his Sophia is the grand lady promoting Opals in South Australia. She sells to retail shops but also takes in folks to her house on occasion and this is one of those occasions. They just returned from a China sales and promotion tour at 5 AM and still took a visit from us. Sophia gives us a lesson on Opals and man ‘o man she opens boxes of the most beautiful and oh so expensive Opals ever. When the royals came last month, the area promoter of commerce knew who to ask for a gift for baby George and she shows us a photo. A miniature truck will Opals filling the bed and was it ever cute. So we know we are in the right place but Sophia is great and works with us to find something in our price range. Well, at the high end of our price range but we all agree this chance will not come again.

Australia produces 96% of the world’s Opals and South Australia where we are account for 86% of the Opals in the world. The new money in the world wants these beauties so the price will only go up. Gulp! We dig deep and walk out with some beauties. Says Krimhilde in a daze, "I never thought I would own an Opal". "Humm, me either.

We head out for wine. Before we hit the first winery we stop by a huge tree where a family actually made their home for 7 years....hearty folks and pretty amazing. After the opal purchase we thought we might want to check out tree living.

We hit the first winery, Yalumba and take a taste or two, are impressed and take some to remember.

The second winery, Seppeltfield, sits in a beautiful spot lined with date palms. The palms are part of a trial that did not work out – not hot enough for good dates. They were one of the first wineries in Barossa and specialize in wonderful "fortified" wines which we would call port. You can buy 100 year old ports, but would pay about $60k for a bottle.

We are in for a treat as they stack up a barrel of port from each year and they started around 1851. Here is the double treat – for a little extra, we get to try a glass from our birth year. I won’t tell you the other years but my 1947 port was amazing. We all sip each year. It was like syrup but oh some much better! That was fun!

The unfortified wine however did not measure up so off we go to have a fast lunch. Overlooking a vineyard we sit outside in amazing sun without too much heat (did I tell you our hot line to the weather gods is working?!) and out comes a giant bread board filled with sour dough bits, olive oil, thin slices of ham, several cheese bits and other delights. Great lunch and now we can take in more wine.

We get our last tasting outside overlooking the vineyard at Murray Street Vineyards, Bingo! We are headed next to Cairnes and the wine is not famous for a reason. So we need some "Take Away" as they say here and this is the place.

The home of the Aho Cellar is filled with Syrah from the Paso region and we found last year it is called Sadat (I have the spelling wrong but the sound is right!) in South America. Here the folks here call is Sharaz with a hard "Razz" at the end. They do a fine job with the grape here and we find some keepers for, get this, $25 bucks. This is great stuff with a long finish that calls for sitting back in the chair and taking in some sights with sip after sip. We grab a bunch for the road. Now, in between all the wine and Opals we were keeping a sharp eye for Kangaroos, at least a sharp eye until winery three.

Our guide Jayne saw a few but we saw only trees. But fine trees they are and a forest of Gum trees is a beautiful sight.

We have had a great time with Jayne and we talk her into having dinner with us as we finish off a couple bottles of our finds today over a nice steak on the side walk in downtown Adalaide.

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We are so happy we found this area and the wonderful people. This is a do over for sure. We have an invitation to visit the mines and Jayne, the great lady that led us around just happens to do trips to the outback. Would that be a kick?!! We have to think of that and doing the trip with our new friend Jayne would be, awell, unbelievable. Our plane leaves in the morning. We are headed to the area of the Great Barrier Reef and a rain forest adventure in North East Australia. How cool is that! Cheers.... to all we met in the Barossa Valley and Adelaide.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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