December 27: Dreams of Beer, Beef, and Beach Babes in Bikinis

After a night of dreaming about white sand beaches and Australian adventure, we hopped out of bed ready for another day! Well rested and well received by our couchsurfer hosts Brad and Sarah, we bolted off early with our sights set on the Hunter Valley wine country. Brad and Sarah had given us some basic directions and Iodetta led us to our exit as we followed her car. Despite getting a little turned around early on, we managed to find our way to our destination.

The wine country is just as beautiful as one might expect. It is a valley of rolling hills lined with lush green vineyards and amazing properties. At the start of the valley is a small tourism bureau (reminded me of Mom) where we were able to gather a map and some brochures. Following the map, we began our solo tour and marveled at the landscape as we drove. This place would be a wine connoisseur's paradise! I can’t imagine anyone not being able to find a wine to their liking among the hundreds if not thousands of choices between all the different wineries.

Although we never managed to go on a tour of any of the wineries due to either bad timing or ridiculous costs, we did get to have many samplings. One winery even had a cheese factory where I was able to indulge in sampling many varieties of one of my all-time favorite treats. I mean, who could turn away free cheese?

We had a nice little lunch of chicken pizza at a bar and grill at one of the wineries. Then we went across the highway to another winery which was also famous for their beer.

After lots of wine tasting, I was kind of excited to try some local frosty brew. This place was really cool. The beer was called “Blue Tongue” and it had one of the coolest looking emblems of any beer I had ever seen. We sat down at a nice outdoor patio area as we enjoyed the mild warm weather and listened to the tunes of an amazing guitarist. This guy must have been Carlos Santanna’s brother!

I swiftly made my way into the bar to grab one of their trademark brews. When ordering, much to my great joy I discovered I didn’t have to face the usual dilemma of choosing a beer…I could have an entire paddle of beers! One of each of the six flavors of Blue Tongue beer they offered. What a deal!

Just so you don’t think I’m an alcoholic, I should be clear. The beers weren’t full size and were in something more like 8 oz. glasses. It was just right. I liked them all with the exception of the ginger beer. I just don’t think I could handle much of that one. Sarah enjoyed taking lots of pictures to produce a sort of slideshow history of my drinking endeavors. After I finished them all, I returned the paddle only to discover yet another surprise…a free pint of beer! Apparently they reward you for returning the wooden paddle (might have been a neat keepsake) by giving you another big beer of your choice. After a little more relaxing in the warm afternoon glow, we decided to push on.

Since we were mostly flying by the seat of our pants, we didn’t even really know for sure where to go next. We didn’t even have a place to stay for the night yet! After looking through our trusty Lonely Planet guidebook, we decided to shoot for Port Stephens, a peninsula like area jutting off of the coast out into the ocean. By the sound of it, it would be a nice beach locale. Once we arrived, we weren’t disappointed. Except that when we first went into town (I believe it was Port Anna) since we thought we had better try to find a place to stay. Much to my disbelief, there was not a single open room in the entire city. Apparently, Christmas break is prime holiday time for Australians. It is basically their version of the American spring break. Sarah kind of predicted this would happen, but I had disagreed…until now. Don’t tell her I said so, but she was right! We were a little clueless as to what we should do, but we finally decided to backtrack inland a few miles to a small town we had driven through earlier that day. We quickly found a very quaint little hotel in the quiet small town called “Sleepy Inn”. The owner/manager was extremely kind and the price wasn’t bad at all, so we booked it. We weren’t expecting much, but the room was actually very nice. It was very apparent how much work the new motel owners were putting into the place, and we were impressed. We couldn’t help but feel happy to be providing the nice people with some business as well!

After emptying the car of our luggage, we headed back out to the Port Stephens area. Before getting back to the sea side town of Port Anna, we turned off to check out One Mile Beach. From the Lonely Planet description, it sounded pretty amazing. Once we arrived, I wasn’t let down.

It was an absolutely amazing secluded beach tucked away behind a thick grove of vegetation. On one side, was a rocky point jutting out into the crashing waves. From there, the beach seemed to extend outward infinitely and finally bowed back inward forming a kind of horseshoe shape. It looked to be every bit of a mile long. On the far side, it was comprised of some colossal sand dunes facing out over the ocean. We could even see Jeeps or dune buggies in the distance. In the water people were surfing in some areas, swimming in others, and some people were even kite surfing! There were lots of sunbathers as well. Which reminds me…we have constantly seen and heard advertisements warning people of the dangers of skin cancer and the importance of sun block and other skin protection. Apparently, Australia has by far the largest percentage of skin cancer cases of any other nation in the world! Even with all that reminding going on in the media, people still seemed to want to roast themselves as usual.

We hung out at the beach for a little while, but the sun was starting to set and we were famished and ready for some good food. We jumped back into the trusty rental Rio and drove back to where we had been earlier that day, Port Anna. The ocean side area of the town was a very picturesque shopping area lined with small shops and eateries paralleled by docks jutting out into the water with all sorts of nice private boats tied off for the day. It didn’t take long for us to spot our diner. It was called the “Hogs Breath Café” and its specialty was prime rib. Seemed like an obvious choice for us! Sarah ordered a BBQ ranch chicken burger which was huge, and judging by her expressions, was delicious. I had prime rib smothered with mushrooms, with another Australian beer to wash it all down. We thought we were in Heaven! It was great!

Afterward, we perused the little shops for a short while and enjoyed the nice, evening weather. Before long, that familiar exhausted feeling was creeping over us. So we made the short drive back out to the aptly named Sleepy Inn to call it a night. In no time at all, we slipped from our real life dreams-come-true to the more familiar ones of the night.

-Brandon Carney