Yarra Valley Wineries

On the second day with Sandra and Des, we drove through the stunning Yarra Valley, stopping at numerous wineries along the way. It was drizzling off and on, but sometimes the sun would burst through and give us some amazing views of the surrounding hills. Everything was incredibly green, which I guess is unusual, as rainfall isn't that prolific here.

All of the wineries had "cellar doors," which was their lingo for free wine tastings. The area is known for reds, pinot noire in particular, and chardonnay. We had great fun at all of the tastings. 

We also got to take a tour through a Moet and Chandon winery. They took us through the whole process of making "sparkling wine," which is Champagne made outside of Champagne, France so it has to be called sparkling wine. The picture below shows the sparkling wine going through the process of riddling, where the wine is turned 90 degrees every few months so the yeast sinks to the bottom. The tour guide asked our group, which consisted of Asian people and our party, to guess who invented the riddling process. I blurted out in a loud, desperate tone, "Tom Riddle!" then commenced to chuckle at myself for my one stroke of cleverness allowed per month. Unfortunately, no one got my Harry Potter reference except for Drew, and the silent response was quite deafening. Harry Potter? No? Darn, I thought that one was a winner.....

After all of our wine tasting, we needed a place to picnic on our coat of arms sausage, tasty cheese, and crackers. No, tasty is not an adjective, but it is actually a type of Australian cheese that is amazing! Some kind of extra sharp, extra aged cheddar that all cheese enthusiasts should try. Anyways, we stopped at a park with a covered picnic table and went to town. Eventually, we noticed the park was full of parrots, many of them staring at us from the trees. Des, who must have a secret language with the parrots because they loved him, decided to try to feed one. All he had to do was hold a crumbled cracker on his outstretched palm, and the parrots came swooping in! I've never had a wild bird eat right out of my hand before. And they were such beautiful birds! 

Eventually, the rest of us decided we had to try too. 

Dinner consisted of local cider, which was delicious and came with a free mustache! We also finally tried kangaroo, which was actually quite delicious. It was leaner than beef and had more of a gamier flavor, but it was certainly milder than say venison or elk. It was matched with a recurrent jam, and the end result was fantastic.