Getaway

New South Wales, Australia

The Hunter Valley vineyards

Australia's oldest wine region, 2h north of Sydney

Hunter Valley is Australia's oldest wine region: vines have been planted on the banks of the Hunter River since the 1820s. Two hours' drive north of Sydney, it now holds more than 150 estates, and it's the favourite weekend escape of Sydneysiders.

✓ Visited 3 times

Hunter Valley

01What makes this valley unique

If you take one word away from the Hunter Valley, make it Semillon. The Semillon made here is considered the world's finest expression of the grape — and it resembles no other white wine.

The fruit is picked very early, giving a wine of surprising lightness, at only 10 to 11.5% alcohol, fermented in stainless steel with no time in oak. Young, it's austere, almost severe. But after ten, fifteen, sometimes twenty years in bottle it transforms completely and develops a complexity few whites ever reach. No other region produces a wine so low in alcohol that ages so remarkably.

The other great local wine is Shiraz, in an earthy, savoury style a long way from the power of Barossa.

✎ Tyrrell's Vat 1 Semillon is Australia's most-awarded white wine. If you only visit one estate, make it that one — their 1863 winery building, with its earthen floor, is still standing.

✎ contrary to what people assume about Australian vineyards, the Hunter's climate is warm and humid, sitting at the northern edge of the latitudes considered viable for quality wine. Harvest here is the earliest in the country: January and February.

02Getting around

The estates sit a fair distance from one another: it's best to plan a way to get around, whether a rental car, a tour group, or a "Bob" — the designated driver, the one who won't be drinking — to visit several properties in a day.

The heart of the region is Pokolbin, where dozens of cellar doors sit within ten minutes of each other. Around it: Cessnock, the gateway town, Lovedale, quieter and more low-key, Broke for the scenery, and Mount View for elevated views.

Plenty of places to stay let you make a weekend of it, right in the heart of the vineyard scenery — by far the better option, if only to avoid getting back on the road.

✎ tastings are no longer free. Most cellar doors now charge between AU$10 and AU$15, often deducted if you leave with a bottle. Booking a slot has become the norm at weekends.

✎ a hot air balloon flight at dawn over the vines is the region's signature experience — and probably the best way to grasp its scale.

03The Christmas Lights Spectacular

I've had the chance to visit three times, including once over Christmas, under a scorching sun, for the Christmas Lights Spectacular at Hunter Valley Gardens. The park lights up with more than 1.5 million lights, unfolding different magical themes all across the grounds.

It's a strange and rather wonderful experience for a European: finding a snowy Christmas scene, reindeer and glowing fir trees while it's over thirty degrees and the sun has barely gone down. The exact opposite of everything those images usually mean.

✎ the event runs from early November to late January, but not every evening across the whole period — check the calendar before driving two hours. And the lights only come on after dark, which in the southern summer means around 8:30pm.

Christmas lights

04Beyond the wine

The valley isn't only about its cellars. You'll find artisan cheesemakers and chocolatiers, olive oil producers, distilleries, some of the best restaurants in New South Wales, and the Hunter Valley Gardens themselves — twenty-five hectares of themed gardens, well worth a wander outside the Christmas season too.