Once again, following recommendations, one place we were told time and time again was a must-see while in Tasmania was Apsley Gorge Vineyard in Bicheno on the East coast.

We arrived in time for lunch, which was a real treat – the cellar door turned out to be more of a boatshed where as well as sampling their wines, you can buy crayfish to eat overlooking the moored up fishing boats. It turns out that it’s the crayfishing that is the real source of income for Brian Franklin, owner of Apsley Gorge Vineyard – with the winemaking more of a personal passion. The Chardonnays were the stars for me – with a choice of the rich and buttery 2000 vintage or the fresher more Burgundian 2005. The prices were amazingly affordable for wines of their quality, and Tim and I were in agreement that the 2005 was not only one of the best Chardonnays that we’d had in a while, but also by far the best buy while we were in Tasmania – as well as enjoying a bottle with our crayfish we ended up buying a fair bit to take with us

Apsley Gorge Vineyard Chardonnay 2005.
Nose is subtle and Burgundian in style, palate has lovely delicate white peach fruit and fresh acidty complemented by gentle, well integrated oak influence.

With a combination of a great Backpackers, friendly little seaside town, Freicinet National park just along the coast and a colony of tiny penguins coming back to their burrows at night, Bicheno turned out to be a great place to stay, and unless we’d had time limitations we’d have almost certainly stayed longer.

The aforementioned Freicinet National park was my favourite in Tassie, we climbed the rather blustery Mt Amos for the amazing view of the topically named ‘Wineglass bay.’ This stunning place rather gruesomely named because back in the days of whaling, it was a favourite place for the whaling boats to shelter from storms – and the blood from the ships turned the whole bay wine-red!