This Day Should Last Forever

Hunter Valley

My Christmas gift to Lauren, was a trip to the Hunter Valley; New South Wales’ most famous vineyard area. This was the first time I got to experience the place without being on the back of a pre-planned tour bus.

Our first day, we set out to go wine-tasting from our estate cottage. There had been some heavy showers in the previous few days, though the ground seemed pretty firm on leaving across some beaten footpaths. We both simply wore thongs/flip-flops/sandals (depending where you come from!) and were having a blast stealing the odd grape from the vines for an unofficial taste session. Jumping across puddles was fun too… but then came bigger puddles, and puddles that wanted to keep our footwear. We both ended up walking bare-foot through the sloppy clay/soil to avoid losing our shoes and when we finally reached the end of the trail, we had to use more puddles to wash the crud from between our toes and legs.

Several hours later, we were sampling Thai food at Tempus Two over a bottle of Muscato, giggling away after a morning’s worth of wine consumption. The weather on the whole behaved itself, but we still got wet as we walked the long peaceful walk back past more vines to our temporary home for the final evening in the valley.

During the week, my almost regular visit to ‘The Metro’ rolled around. This time, to see English electronic/experimental rock outfit; UNKLE. For the first time, the band brought out some kind of stage dressage with them, and it made a huge change to see a decent lighting rig here, especially to accompany a band of this genre. It turned out to be my favourite gig I’d seen there, and my favourite gig for quite some time, that left my ears ringing for a day or two afterwards.