G’day, All!
It’s Friday here in the land Down Under, and a wonderfully beautiful day here in Dunsborough! (Think, though, that it may still be raining in Albany … a lovely spot, but as we discussed with Norm and Marg about the rainforest around Coffs Harbour – it doesn’t get to be a “rain” forest for nothing!)
We had a leisurely wake-up this morning, as no place we really wanted to be until 10 a.m. and the Ngilgi (pronounced: Nee-gee (soft “g”)) cave. As we didn’t have much of anything here for breakfast (unfortunately no leftovers!) we went into town to see what was available. Apparently Dunsborough doesn’t really wake up until 8 or later, so we had to settle for huge apple/almond muffins and milk/coffee at the local coffee house. Very reminiscent of the 60’s, including Bob Dillon playing not so softly in the background.
Back to the cottage, and as R had some Caltech business to attend to, and I wanted to post yesterday’s blog, we went down to the office at 8:30 and took care of business. Amazingly inconvenient, I’m sure – not only for us, but for the nice folks who run this place! But, got things done and off to the Cave for the 10 a.m. tour. Well…interesting place, this cave. It actually goes down the equivalent of a 12 story building … that’s deep! It also had a small “tunnel” to crawl through, if so desired…which was where I made my mistake. I’ve never been claustrophobic before, but after diving head-first into this tunnel (strictly optional, and constructed out of metal, so you weren’t crawling through rocks! But the guide told a story of a supposedly 82-year old man who had done it twice last week…and we’ll believe that when we see it…) with R following … first off, it’s pitch black inside; can’t see a thing, and you just have to sort of push your way through on your hands and knees; WAY too low to stand, even hunched over! So here I am, pushing my purse ahead of me, and this darn tunnel starts to drop – ended up being easier to slide a bit of the way, and FINALLY saw the proverbial “light at the end of the tunnel.” Thank goodness! I’m afraid I rather burst out of the tunnel – not very happily, I might add! After that, I was really spooked, and starting to climb down all those stories – I made it 4 or 5 I reckon, with huge boulders pressing in from various directions, and that was it…no more for me…foolishly started thinking about earthquakes and trapped coal miners in West Virginia – and I was out of there! Figure I prefer my caves to be a little less vertical and a bit more horizontal…on to the wine tasting!
This was our first winery to taste (only had lunch at Xanadu yesterday) and were a bit nervous, not knowing what to expect. We started at Pierro, which had been recommended by our restaurant keeper from Bay Cottage. We were the only tasters there, and it was just like Napa Valley in the really OLD days (back in the 70’s…) – just wine tasting and information about the wines, no pressure, no cost, no glasses to buy!! – no limit to how much you could sample, just a very gracious lady pouring! We tried four or five varieties including a vintage Chardonnay; just great! As we (unfortunately) are travelers with luggage limitations, we were only able to buy one bottle; chardonnay, which I am enjoying even as I type! From there we went to Brookland Valley, a really beautiful estate; lots of water, little bridge, incredible shop in the tasting room. (Oh! They don’t call them “tasting rooms” here – they call them “cellar doors” – the only thing we can think of is that if the “cellar door” is open, you can go in! Make sense??) Brookland is most famous for their cabernet and – true confessions – we bought a bottle of that too! Figure that we can certainly get one bottle back to Adelaide, if necessary! Looked at Brookland’s restaurant (Flutes) menu, but decided it was a bit too fancy, and we pushed on to our last winery of the day, Vasse Felix. As it was lunchtime, we headed straight to their restaurant; on the second floor, overlooking a stream and lots of vines. Their menu was really fancy too – it’s amazing to think that there are dozens of very small restaurants in the various wineries (lots of wineries include restaurants)! R ordered a wonderful dish of baked ricotta and tomato topped with greens, grilled eggplant, and parmesan, with a balsamic vinegar dressing. I ordered curried chicken with peanuts and scallions and jasmine rice; really good, but R’s dish was better! Decided to forgo a fancy dessert and instead headed back to the cottage for naps.
Afterwards, went to the store for dinner supplies. Found some very nice shrimp and snow peas at Cole’s. Back to the cottage and while R worked on Caltech stuff, I took my book down to the beach for a lovely, quiet read – just a beautiful afternoon! R forgot to get garlic at the store, so we needed to make an emergency run – and boy, did we see a scary sight on the way to the store! The shopping center is right on the edge of town closest to Caves Road, where many of the wineries are – and there were two police cars randomly stopping cars and, I can only imagine, doing “drink” driving checks!! Whew! I mean, neither of us had had enough to be worried, but we both had tasted – and that’s a bit too close for comfort! So…something to keep in mind if/when we head to the Barrossa Valley in South Australia!
Dinner was great; R did a wonderful job with spicy shrimp, snow peas and rice – and he also did the dishes! So, now we’re relaxing with our books, in preparation for packing up and moving tomorrow to Fremantle … which we hopefully will like better than Perth!
So, more later!
Much love,
m
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