Heylo Hunter Valley

The week of Easter was meant to be a holiday, having just gotten back to work I must confess I was truly looking forward to a break! This one was special, we were going with Venky, Sharanya and Riya- most certainly meant double the fun! What a lovely couple these guys are, super enthu cutlets who certainly make traveling fun with their endless tales and impeccable sense of humor! Needless to say the kids Riya and Tu get on fabulously well too( touch wood!) and that makes these travel companions all the more indispensable to us!

Venky and AJ go back a long way! Sharanya and I had a brief meet up long ago.. But when we got to know they were relocating from Singapore to Sydney, I don't know who was happier- AJ or me!!😆 The biggest bane of being away from home is that you very rarely have true friends! 🙄🤔😞. We have been lucky, in Bangalore we always had a healthy dose of family and friends, in Minneapolis we had the wonderful Palanisamy's- Adhi and Bhavani- we were almost weekend fixtures in their house 😆😂. When back in India we again had Sidey/Manoj or Hamsa/Shyam....! 😬😆 but when AJ announced this relocation to Sydney, gosh was I apprehensive or what?! New country, with a baby is quite a daunting task indeed! So when Venky announced his intent to relocate we literally rejoiced! As luck would have it they moved in practically next door!! 😆😆 praise the lord! We couldn't be happier! They are travel buffs too and so it was only a matter of time before the wheels churned and come Easter and we escaped to the beautiful Hunter Valley!

We rented an 8 seater and packed up literally half our house and kitchen into it! Some early scouting had gotten us a rather near deal in Leisure Inn, Pokolbin! All excited we set off on Friday morning. Planned to leave at 9, needless to say with the kids and everything we only left at ten! The traffic headed out of Sydney with us was quite relentless!! We got to the outskirts only a good hour later! Tu almost immediately slept off and Ria kept herself busy so the first hour was largely uneventful only filled with endless mirth as we all reacted to Venky's hilarious narratives! Anyone who knows him well will agree he ought to pick a job as an RJ , he has this uncanny ability to make his audience guffaw! 😆😬

As we wound through Pennat Hills we couldn't  but help sigh in regret that one of those many fancy houses wasn't ours! (Yea yea that was mostly the womenfolk in the car!😆🙈)

In another hour we were well on our way and as the mobile signals vanished we decided to follow the road signs and took a detour into the scenic drive route! (T3 was it?)

We started winding into some countryside and came across a cafe, Tu was still sleeping and Riya looked like she could hold a bit longer for a break.  Not the best of decisions!! There wasn't another restaurant until nearly an hour- Laguna. While it isn't much to look at from outside it certainly served some yumm food, we had a beets salad and a veg lasagne.. Both mouth wateringly yummmm. The restroom looked straight out of a fairy tale and before it started drizzling we started out to Pokolbin!

From here Pokolbin was just an hour away, we reached Cessnock in no time at all! Then we slowly wound our way to Leisure Inn Pokolbin... What a lovely property!! Lining a small waterfront, flanked by vineyards this seemed like the perfect getaway for a relaxed weekend.. 😬

Our Queen Apartments were good, we plonked our luggage in our respective rooms and headed for a walk around the property. The hills gave us some perfect photo opps even as the Roos grazed along the property. What a picture perfect sight! 

The walk proved eventful as AJ spotted some birds. A couple of horses grazing along the lake made it seem even more scenic!

All in all a wonderful way to end a wonderful day. We got back to our rooms and got dinner readied for the babies while the men went off to get us some dinner from Cessnock. Predictably they got us some Indian food from a nearby Indian restaurant!(snort) however the food was so yumm we just hogged away to glory! The plan for next day was meanwhile finalised over whatsapp once the kids were put to bed- Hunter Gardens it was and we looked forward with glee! 

The next morning was a whole bunch of excitement- the two kids woke up rushing into each other's arms "happy to see each other" 😆 not that they had been away from each other for too long! We had our breakfast n headed off to Hunter Gardens. The shopping village at the entrance is beautifully quaint- the cafes serve excellent flat whites, the enclosed park is good for the kids, the touristy shops are fun to stroll by. Occasionally they snare you into buying something 😏

We spent an hour here and then almost close to 11 AM we entered the Hunter Gardens. The truth is before Tu we would have scoffed at such touristy places and turned Up our nose at such docile places! Probably found it boring even. It houses variants of gardens- rose garden, an artificial waterfall, a story book garden that had an Easter egg hunt, a Chinese garden, a maze etc you get the drift... 😬 being a parent changes your very outlook to life... Any activity that is stroller friendly and allows you the opportunity to see your child squeal in happiness (even if it is at the sight of a bunch of roses or a butterfly) seems fantastic!! 😆😆😬 add to it some restrooms with a baby change room and a decent restaurant - ahem- that borders on ideal almost!! (Cross my heart no exaggeration this) 😂😂😜

The rise garden with its grandma themed sculptures was a beautiful sight and as we rounded this garden we came upon the beautifully landscaped waterfalls

As we winded up behind the falls we came upon a fairytale like area that was a populist wedding destination we were told, in fact it was being set up for one that afternoon, we were promised the arrival of a bride in a pumpkin  carriage if we wanted to wait 😍💃🏻

We walked along to reach a buzzing kids activity area- the story book garden. Tu absolutely enjoyed it!!

By the time we crossed this and came to the maze Tu had dozed off! :-( poor thing the heat was proving to be too much for her

By then Venky Sharanya and Ria were also feeling the heat and we decided to head to the restaurant to grab some lunch...when we reached there it was too noisy n there was a long wait to get anything at all!! 😞 so AJ decided to order and I decided to push her stroller into the Chinese garden. Proved to be a good decision as Tu continued to sleep!

Beautiful landscapes kept me occupied and in about thirty mins AJ came to grab me saying the food may be ready but Venky would give us a shout out if it did come along- they had a table for all of us. Just as we started wheeling tu back in her stroller Venky did call - the fries were on the table by the time we arrived and Tu just got up as we reached! Lunch was some veggie burgers and everything was tasty and as we finished our food we realised just how tired we all were! As we headed out we ensured we planned the next day out (we telebooked ourselves into a chopper ride and a horse carriage ride) all planned around our kids sleep schedules! We headed back to Leisure Inn and as we picked up food for the night we also picked some spiced rum .. Ha ha! That was hoping for a lot, needless to say we didn't get to drink much that night! Tired kids kinda tend to take over your evenings and nights 😜😆

As the next day dawned we headed to Epicure Cafe for some breakfast! What an awesome place by a small lake, some amazingly courteous service and the tasty food made for a phenomenal brunch! To top it all off the lady also gave us a card that entitled us to some discounts at a nearby winery!! The kids had a good time and so did we! 

A colleague had recommended we have the Chamborcin at Ivanhoe Winery, so that's where we headed next!! 

What a nice little winery! But turned out they were out of the Chamborcin and so they let us taste the Chamborcin champagne... Loved the undertones of chocolate in it, but somehow I am not a fan of the bubbly so we didn't buy any! 😐 none the less we rolled around on the large grounds near the parking lot before heading off for our chopper ride!

And yes I meant literally rolled around!!! 😆😆😂

The chopper ride was at 2, we had to get to the Cessnock airport. We made a stop at the Chocolate room - the coffee n Chocolate mint goodies were so yumm! 

Pitstop done and some refuelling sure helped prep us up for the ride! We reached a bit late but after getting our payment done we eagerly awaited our turn for the heli ride! First it was Venky n family- Ria certainly didn't enjoy her ride too much. And when we got in with Tu she started wailing her heart out!! There was no way she would sit separately so I just cuddled her up in my arms but god she wailed louder than even the sound of the chopper blades above! 🙈🙊🙉🙉🙉 those six mins were one of the worst ever n when AJ turned around from the front holding his iPhone n shooting a video of us clueless of the trauma in the backseat I could have thumped him I swear!! 😆😆😤

Once we got off it all turned good, both the kids took turns telling us "no more helicopter" and that was that! We headed back to the hotel for some coffee and soon it was 4:30 pm and we had to get to our horse carriage ride! We booked the whole carriage to ourselves for an hour!! This was the best ride ever!

The lil boy and our lil ones seemed to have a spl connection and with some jokes going we set off. The horseman made a couple of pit stops along the ride- through some vineyards making for some lovely scenery!!

The Clipetty clop of the horses hooves got Tu all excited, Ria and Tu had an absolute blast changing their sides frequently through the ride!

 

As we wound out of the vineyard we still had some lovely sights of the hill bound vineyards

Unfortunate I ran out of space in my mobile for any more pics!! Woes of being in a new country (having clicked one too many pics in recent times) with a toddler( and hence no time to transfer it out) 🙈

Anyways the day wound up rather well, we again raised the Indian restaurant in Cessnock for another lovely dinner.today though after the lil ones slept AJ n Venky finished up their spiced rum and hopefully it added to the spice in their lives! 🤓😬

The next day we packed up n left by ten, the vacation was over 😭 but we decided to detour to The Entrance on the way back!! Turned out to be a lovely decision. We stopped at a park entire thinking it was close to a beach! The kids had their packed lunch but then we realised it wasn't beach accessible at all!! We drove another mile to reach the beach and what a riot it was! Lovely blue gushing waves, white sandy beach with some good changing rooms!

 Tu had a ball! And all in all a lovely afternoon. We were super hungry and we noticed an Indian restaurant that seemed closed! But the host rather graciously opened the kitchen again for us! One scrumptious meal later we started off to Westmead and reached home in the next hour- A tired lot but super happy and all smiles! The kids had a whale of a time and so did we and Tu officially announced that she loved holidays with Venky, Shanny and Ria. Was it nice I asked , "it was awesome!!" She said .. And I truly agreed! 😬 lets hope this is the first of many more such vacations to come! Wine country has initiated a wonderful holiday experience for us, Cheers to having some awesome friends who make our vacations awesome indeed! 🍷🍷