Hunter Valley Weekend
05 July 2017 / Text and Photos - Ken Keeling
The Canberra Chapter’s Hunter Valley Weekend, started on the 26th May, a crisp Friday morning with our initial small party of 4 MX5’s assembled at the right place. At the appointed hour and we were away on our run - ahead of time for a change. Being brisk, it was tops up along the Federal and Hume Highways to our first stop for coffee and to rendezvous with 3 more of our planned 8 cars. Our second leg saw some brave souls roof down and facing the chill as we left the freeway and took the Old Hume to enjoy a traffic free run over the Razorback before re-joining the traffic on the Northern Road to Windsor and Old Pitt Town for our lunch stop at the historic “Bird-in-Hand Inn” (no small servings here) and to meet up with the last of our weekend run entourage, an RPM car from Bathurst.
The afternoon weather was balmy so our post-lunch run was “topless” to Wiseman’s Ferry and along the Hawkesbury River before cutting over the ridges to Wollombi to regroup before our last leg of the day to Cessnock. The evening was spent at the Bowling Club which was not only within easy walking distance but also provided us with meals of great quality and value as well as a convivial environment to unwind from our 9-hour day.
Saturday was planned to be a free day for individual activity but we coalesced into a single group of all 8 cars and 16 people for an excellent breakfast in the sunshine at Pokolbin Village (photo #1 - Breakfast in the sunshine).
With a wide selection of cellar doors, a craft market, chocolate factory, cheese cellars, or tours of wineries and vineyards to choose from the group broke up to pursue their individual interests before regrouping for lunch at Tatler Vineyards’ Tapas Café. The response from the staff to 16 people turning up for lunch as an unplanned group was marvellous. Although everyone was happy to settle onto small tables, the café staff quickly set up a “white linen” banquet bench in a sunny area with views over the vineyard – maybe that was best considering the volume of our group in full conversation mode. The chef came and outlined what sort of things were on offer from the tapas menu - and, surprisingly, “No problem!” was the response when we queried whether we could order as couples and pay separately. The food really was excellent and was able to be enjoyed with wines from that vineyard - Tatler’s certainly merits another visit sometime (photo #2 - At Tatler Vineyards).
The remainder of the afternoon was free time. It was noted that a few partially consumed bottles of wine made their way to the cars for the run back to the motel, which demonstrated the theme that “… wine needs to be enjoyed responsibly…” was clearly on everyone’s mind – and there was always the off-chance a booze bus might be lurking!
To my surprise, when suggesting options for the evening’s activities, I was presented with a unanimous vote to return to the Bowling Club - confirmation indeed that everyone had enjoyed the previous evening. That decision taken, to replicate our successful Friday evening was easy.
Sunday morning was a slow start and we made our way to Wollombi village to have coffee and enjoy a wander through the local street market. A short drive then had us at the quaintly maned “Mulla Villa Cowshed” to join the other MX5-ers attending the Hunter Chapter’s Charity Lunch - a worthy event with a good roll-up of some 100 people and (by my count) 54 MX5s, one lonely Fiat Abarth Spider and a few family-type cars (photo #3 - At The Mulla Villa Cowshed).
After lunch a few of our group made their way back to the winery region via the Wollombi-Broke road, which provided a very enjoyable finale to the MX5 event. The rest of the afternoon involved cellar doors, again with an eye to responsibility as “the booze bus” was in evidence. The irony was that the one member of our group selected was he who had abstained all day. I envisage that the conversation went something along the lines of “… not a drop all day, officer!’ … “Just blow in the tube sir. Oh! It really is a zero reading! And in the Hunter wine region??...”
The several days of constantly grazing the goodies on offer in the Hunter vineyards gave rise to a unanimous decision that we would just have an “alfresco evening gathering” in the motel’s Bar-BQ area and enjoy some of the accumulated cheese, pate & etc. - and wine! (photo #4 - Al fresco feasting).
And a rather enjoyable evening that turned out to be - until the chill of night drove us to our respective rooms.
Monday morning, 29th May, had several cars departing early to travel home by the highways. The remaining five chose to travel “via the roads less travelled “. Our Bathurst car led us into the picturesque Upper Hunter and via the Bylong Valley Way to Rylstone for our morning coffee (photo #5 - In the Upper Hunter Valley).
After an enjoyable run over the hills, via Sofala, our RPM car dropped off at Bathurst and the remaining 5 cars headed to Oberon for a late-ish lunch.
The sector of the home leg from Oberon via Shooters Hill and Taralga to Goulburn was an enjoyable way to wind up our weekend run. A short break at Goulburn allowed goodbyes to be said before we headed home individually.
Another enjoyable Canberra Chapter away with 1239 kms under our NC’s wheels (photo #6 - Home again - and the last of the autumn leaves).
