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Published: October 4th 2005
The Kangy Angy Indeed!
This past weekend was Labour Day here in New South Wales. Not anywhere else. Not, for example in Queensland. It’d be as if Pennsylvania had a big holiday but not New Jersey. At any rate, it worked to our benefit since we live in the state with the holiday and so we went off to Hunter Valley for two days.
Hunter Valley is a big wine area about 2 hours north of Sydney. It’s a popular getaway place full of little resorts and vineyard B&Bs. We were able to grab a last-minute deal over the internet and found ourselves at the four star Tallawanta Lodge.
Les and I love wine, but I don’t know much about it. Les certainly knows more than I do. I’m also limited by the fact that no matter how often I try, I just can’t stand any red wine. So Les told me when we were tasting, to just be honest about my lack of knowledge and to feel comfortable saying what I did and didn’t like.
Our first visit was to the Hunter Valley Gardens Cellar. After the lady poured a red wine, which I was determined
to like, she said something along the lines of. “This is a 30/40 mix. There is a hint of garlic butter that you taste under the rich tones of pad thai. Its best year will be in 2097 and it was aged in barrels made out of oak and corn flakes.”
I stared and nodded and then took a sip. Les looked at me for my opinion that I was going to express politely yet honestly.
“It tastes like corkboard or Birkenstocks sandals.”
After that we agreed that I would just stick to sampling the whites.
Beyond the vineyards, there were some formal gardens near our resort that were award winning and looked lovely. I was excited to get in and walk through them. There was even Storybook Land - - a section of the garden with characters from popular classic children’s books. Les was skeptical about the gardens but I insisted. They would be perfect. Abby would love them and they would be refreshing and peaceful. So in we went.
What no one really mentions in the brochures is that the Hunter Valley is hot. Sizzling in fact. I say sizzling because it’s also dry as a
bone. There is no baking, humid air; rather there is dry, flat heat, the type that sucks every drop of water right out of you. Normally that is the preferable type of heat and Les and I really enjoyed it when at the vineyards. But its effect in formal gardens, which are more about low lying shrubbery than high shady trees, is profound.
Two turns into the gardens and we were all frying. Abby was literally pouring water on herself out of her cup, which seems like an advanced concept for a one year old, but it was just that hot. We made it to Story Land but so did a tourist bus of Japanese tourists which we think perhaps followed us from Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. People were literally standing in lines to take pictures with the giant fiberglass figures from the children’s books. We managed to get up to the giant Alice in Wonderland tea party scene, but when I tried to put Abby on the Mad Hatter’s lap for the obligatory photo she lost it entirely. And so we headed out.
Not that it was easy, once in those gardens it takes a strong
will to get out. We twisted and turned through the sunken garden, the mosaic garden, the rose garden, the Indian garden and the hill with the Broken Back Brumbies. Who knows what a Brumby is. In the gardens they were, I’m guessing, a type of mammal expressed as topiary statues the size of trucks looking very menacing with wild white eyes made out of some heat enduring flower. I’m quite certain that it was their mind that was broken, and what broke it was having to stand in the sun in the middle of a garden forever just out of reach of some good wine. Thankfully we were at a resort with two pools and once finally out of the garden we all flung ourselves in for a pre-dinner swim.
A wonderful feature about our room was that it had a terrace. And so after Abby went to sleep we were able to sit out on our terrace, drink our newly purchased wine, and look at the stars which were incredible. It was one of those great moments where you realize, “I’m in Australia! Those are southern stars! I’m all the way around the world!”
The following day we hit the larger vineyards where we wouldn’t really have to comment on what we sampled. If it wasn’t crowded, we just waited till our shadow-tourist bus turned up and then we had instant group chaos to work with. We kept in the shade and later we explored the valley.
During our exploration we found ourselves on ‘unsealed’ roads in the middle of what seemed to be nowhere. It was just us in our small little rental car bouncing along the roads of dust and dirt. We admired the Australian valley scrub and we watched for kangaroos. Our maps all had kangaroo icons all over them and there were road signs for them just like there are signs for deer in the states. But all we saw were miles of vineyards and valley and eucalyptus.
Suddenly, I screamed. “KANGAROOS!” Les almost drove down the embankment but, after we managed to agree that I’d point out wildlife in a calmer tone from that point on, he pulled over and we looked. Sure enough I’d seen three kangaroos. Only one was still in sight when Les pulled over but there it was hopping at breakneck speed across a field. Hopping! Because that’s what kangaroos do. It was thrilling. Hurrah!!
We hit a few more vineyards, bought some more wine, and then decided it was time to go. It was nap time and we wanted to maximize the hours Abby would sleep while we drove. Of course getting out was not as easy as we’d hoped. About 15 minutes into our drive we hit a traffic jam. Up ahead we saw a cop who was clearly turning people around. “Great”, we thought, “the road is closed.” Our maps didn’t show another road out. But we followed the other cars to a small gas station and I went in to consult.
I entered with about five other drivers. We each held different maps but we were all trying to get to the F3 freeway to Sydney. We mentioned that the road seemed to be closed and one of the employees came over to help us negotiate our way out. Suddenly the door to the back room burst open and a man came out looking a little too happy for the distraction.
“It’s a brush fire!” He yelled.
The lady helping us said, “Well I’m trying to get them to Kurrie Kurrie so they can get on the road there.”
The man was gleeful. “Not if the fire goes through Wyogong! The whole road will be out they’ll never make it.”
“What if they go up past Kurrie Kurrie to Haxton and hop on the Kangy Angy?”
“Sure maybe, but it’ll take five hours, and the whole road may be in the fire.” He looked wildly at us. “You may be stuck here!”
Suddenly it was mayhem. Everyone tried to figure out how to get to Kurrie Kurrie or the Kangy Angy or the Wollolombi on their own map. Meanwhile the man yelling doom and gloom added to a growing sense of urgency that we all best get a move on to ‘beat the fire.’
I noticed that one lady looking moderately competent was edging towards the door. I went over to her.
“Do you know how to get out?”
“No, but those girls do.” She said pointing to two young girls.
I turned around for a second to clarify a point about the Kangy Angy (was it a road? a state of being?) and when I looked back the lady and the girls were gone.
And just like a game of musical chairs when the music stops, we all began running to our cars and forming a chain of lost souls driving madly through the valley. Les managed to catch up to the lady and girls. Meanwhile I noted with a growing sense of apprehension that quite literally all around us were major plumes of smoke.
We raced about for 20 minutes and managed to catch up with a fire truck. We sensed it wasn’t a good sign to be driving with the fire trucks, towards where they were going, but as the man at the gas station pointed out, it was the only way out.
Finally the truck pulled over and we saw it was attending to yet another brush fire over in a field. We all quickly drove by lest they climb out of their truck and put up another road closure. And so our parade of cars managed to get to the highway before the fire crossed the road or any other parts of the drives spontaneously combusted.
I was happy to see a sign clarifying at least one thing on the road home, the name for the F3 freeway at that point was, the Kangy Angy.
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Rach
non-member comment
perhaps the best laugh i've had in a while. thank you :)