the bottle capper
South Australia appears vastly different to much of Australia, yet it is eerily similar. There are valleys, mountains, lakes, arid zones, rugged coast line and dense forest. It features caves, birds, marsupials, road kill, ruins, small town desperation, small town exhilaration and cathartic experiences that leave you embittered and overwhelmed. It’s got wineries, breweries, sun, rain and wind.
Just like the rest of Australia…
The road trip was booked for late November. Clothes for warm weather were packed, shorts, thongs and singlets. Brisbane had been hot and humid for weeks before we left. As an afterthought a jumper was added to the luggage. It proved a smart decision.
Adelaide’s wind was strong and cold, carrying little hope of improvement when we arrived. It was a bad start, weather-wise, and it wouldn’t get much better. Having lived in Victoria for almost 18 years, I should’ve known the weather would be temperamental. The proximity of summer fooled us.
It was 20 degrees when we picked up the keys to our conveyance at the airport, a little white Yarris. The girl at the rental desk performed professionally. I was impressed. In the car park booth, an old Asian woman gave me maps of the city and an Adelaide street directory. In Queensland people often have to pay for the directory.
The journey to the Barossa Valley, usually about 90 minutes, took more than two hours, a slow crawl through peak hour traffic and kilometres of road works.
We went through Elizabeth, a stately named suburb on the outskirts of Adelaide, but one which has a bad reputation. A few years back a feature article suggested Elizabeth contains generations of families who have lived on welfare without anyone ever having a job. Locals say it has an underserved reputation. It didn’t look too bad, though we didn’t linger.
It was about five when we entered the Barossa Valley. For those who haven’t been there, the Barossa isn’t a region or location. Merely, it is a valley filled with hills, squat vineyards and well-fed sheep. There is not much else to see, beyond the occasional ruin or local pub. That is not to suggest the Barossa isn’t a wonderful place, it truly is, but it is much more quaint and slow moving than I imagined.
People trying to describe the Barossa generally sum it up with one word, beautiful, a rather unimaginative, widely encompassing adjective that can adequately describe anything not inherently ugly. It is much more than beautiful, composed of green fields, well watered vineyards, fat cows and sheep and dotted by attractively presented towns. The valley has a relaxing aura, it is impossible not to be overcome by its composure and quietude.
Our only night was spent in Narioopta at the Top Drop motel, a U-shaped structure that appears far beyond its glory days but still attracts clientele, mainly by offering cheap rates. When we arrived the motel was empty. The proprietor, a friendly old woman, thin and neat, laughed at my observation that we had the place to ourselves.
‘We had eight couples here at the weekend,’ she said.
She gave us a room on the ground floor, answered questions about dinner, circling the pubs and restaurants on a map. ‘Given its Monday night, these restaurants aren’t open.’
Our tiny room, outside of tourist season, was $80 for the night. I joked that it seemed overpriced, but I was still getting used to the holiday and budget accommodation. Everything worked though, and the pillows were extraordinary.
We went to Angaston for dinner at the Barossa Brauhaus, an old stone pub maintaining its aged charm in the public bar but losing that sentimentality in the dining room. The pokies are almost intrusive. The food though, pumpkin soup, crumbed lamb cutlets and a medium-well kangaroo fillet was superb. West End and Coopers were the dominant beers on tap. Both were thoroughly enjoyed.
The service was flawless, vastly different to our holiday in Western Australia. We played Keno and didn’t win a cent. Kristine moaned about abstinence, the irony of being in the Barossa, being pregnant and not being able to drink.
Somewhere during dinner, she mentioned how the old woman said certain restaurants weren’t open on Monday night. ‘It’s Tuesday,’ Kristine said. ‘They’re open.’ The gaffe had gone unnoticed for hours. Being on holiday gave us an excuse.
‘I wonder if she realised yet,’ I said.
The following morning three cars dotted the car park at the Top Drop, a slow night. It’s short on frills, but I’d go back. About five, when the birds hung in the vast court yard grape vine, the extra pillow blanked out their chirps, allowing us to sleep in. We ate breakfast in a former bank converted into an Italian restaurant. Kristine twisted away from the counter when the waitress said there were no large coffees available, they’re all the same size, and the chef wasn’t due until 10:30am.
Her mood was entirely my fault. I raised eyebrows in defence to the waitress, who smiled fully and suggested the chef might front for work early.
Coffee came in a mug that was neither small nor large, not quite a happy medium. It was adequate, if one requires just one coffee. I didn’t. Kristine, having recovered her decorum after her miniscule outburst, sipped her latte and spied a woman dressed in white, a contrast to the black-dressed waitress. The chef had arrived early, at ten, and food would settle us further.
When the waitress delivered our breakfast Kristine apologised for the impatience. The waitress disregarded the apology with professional ambiguity. The customer might not always be right, but at the end of the meal the customer will always pay. It should have been me offering apology. Instead, I ordered another coffee, searched Kristine’s eyes for a brief moment then kissed her.
After breakfast we drove a long time, visiting Henscke and Torbreck wineries, spending more than $700 on fifteen bottles of wine, mostly reds, hence how the Barossa remains a quaint, small viable little valley. We went through Angaston and the surrounding hills.
In Tanunda, at Bull Creek Books, I bought a Keith Stackpole biography and A game divided, written by Peter McFarline about Australia’s England tour in 1977 and the emergence of World Series Cricket. At $10 each they were a bargain. Though I wanted it, I replaced a biography on former middleweight champ Randolph Turpin. At $45, it seemed too steep. That seems a stupid decision now.
The man who ran the bookstore was old, fashioned by a fat, white moustache, glasses and a thick white jumper, probably made from wool grown and shorn in the Barossa Valley. He was outrageously friendly. We discussed the books. He seemed surprised I’d never seen Stackpole bat. I seemed surprised he thought I was that old. He wanted to know if Ricky Ponting should stay or go. We settled on two more Tests against New Zealand, like we had the authority to do so.
The old man put a book mark in the Stackpole biography, perhaps in hope I would make contact again. I will, for the Turpin biography.
Tanunda was like the rest of the valley, sleepy, as Kristine kept saying. Like the rest of the valley, Tanunda was dominated by buildings made from stone, an opulent reminder of the past. The Tanunda hotel is made from white stone of varying size and shape, no block too small or odd. A hundred and fifty years ago, stone masons and mills in the valley must’ve worked hard, earned a lot of money and used each gram of rock.
It’s the stone buildings that make the Barossa’s towns captivatingly beautiful, idyllic, a pleasure. There are vast differences in stone, different colours, sizes and shapes. Even the squat stone buildings and houses look magnificent. As each town has modernised, they’ve clung to the past, not by accident, and the valley is somewhere the visitor wonders if retirement or relocation is folly or could be reality, and though many pass through, few will ever set and stay.
Most people, despite eating meat and drinking wine, are not farmers or winemakers. Eking out a living in towns like Tanunda would be harder for a writer than a podiatrist, but the margin would be slim. I’d probably end up owning a second hand bookstore and Kristine would buy a shoe store.
Not a bad existence, if we were sixty. Still, we drove through the valley envious of the beauty and the lifestyle, taking lunch at Maggie Beers’ restaurant, eating on the deck against the chill, watching turtles amble slowly in the large dam.
Our last stop was Greenock, a small town of about 700 people. Peppercorn trees line the streets, offering shade and beauty. Greenock is famous because it is a part of the Barossa, but there isn’t much there beyond the basics, a post office, small school and the aged pub. It still created a fair whack of beauty, and my often repeated line re-emerged, I could live here but I’d need some land.
The brewery, of course, wasn’t marked by a sign. We were in the right place, but no brewery. Kristine said to ask at the Post Office. The woman at the counter shook her head, not today, not on a Wednesday. My blank stare must’ve been amusing. ‘I’m not sure it’s open to the public,’ she said.
That didn’t make sense. Almost every plot of land in the Barossa with a vineyard has a cellar door. The Barossa Brewing Company is almost unique to the area. There are just three breweries in the Valley.
‘You can get the beer in the pub next door,’ she said. ‘They sell it in little bottles.’
Obviously she wasn’t a drinker.
The Greenock Creek Tavern is another old, comfortable pub. Made from stone, the tavern is a single story, four chimney establishment with grey and white canvas awnings. We doubled the patronage by walking in. The ceiling was black, the smell clean, the pool table sitting idle and the fittings, lights and power points, dated by decades. Photos from the local cricket club lined the walls. A large photo from a mountain bike race took pride of place behind the bar, next to the fridge. The bar ran in an arc, by no means modern. The pub was obviously friendly and reasonably small. It probably hasn’t changed much since the seventies.
The bartender, Mick, seemed neither amused nor impressed when asked for a local brew, a Miller’s Lager. He poured from a tap into a fancy stemmed glass and set it down without a smirk or twinkle.
‘Six bucks,’ Mick said. He didn’t smile when receiving the money, just proffered change then chatted to the other two customers. Strangers seemed an oddity best ignored, if only in the first instance. My camera bag was a dead giveaway. Time was needed to warm up. Conversation helped. Halfway through the beer Mick asked where we were from, stepping back from the bar and finally smiling.
‘Brisbane, huh,’ he said. ‘How long are you here for?’
‘We leave today,’ Kristine said, ‘but Matt wanted to sample the local beer before we left.’
‘You like it, don’t you?’ Mick asked as though he already knew the answer.
With three foreign sets of eyes on me, I gave the obvious answer. ‘It’s good.’ The beer, was crisp, well hopped and full bodied, everything I want from beer, my own or those that others produce. Professional was another word I could’ve used to describe it. I told Mick I’d have a Greenock Dark Ale before we left, and asked if he had any stubbies in the fridge.
‘Matt wants to buy some local beer,’ Kristine said.
The fat man in blue working clothes sitting closest at the bar laughed. Mick smiled and looked in the fridge then went out the back. He came back empty handed. At the end of the bar a short man with dark prescription glasses and a full, almost yellow beard regarded us with cool detachment.
Mick stopped in front of the man and said something. The man shook his head and said something back.
Being slightly hard of hearing, too much AC/DC, I couldn’t hear all the words being said. Kristine quickly did the translation. Mick stopped in front of me and said, ‘if you want some local beer, why not talk to the brewer. He’s at the end of the bar.’
The Barossa Brewing Company might not have been open for public viewing, but if one is resourceful or lucky enough, or combines both, the brewer can be found in the most predictable of places.
The brewer, Darrell was in the pub, drinking wine, despite his beer being available on tap. From across the bar I told him I wanted some beer. ‘I’ll help bottle it if I have to.’
‘I’m not doing it myself,’ Darrell said. He blithely rolled a cigarette, unmoved by the interest in his beer and went outside for a smoke.
Kristine and I chatted among ourselves at the irony, the local brewer in the local pub, drinking wine. ‘We get to see his brewery,’ she said.
When Darrell came back in I ordered a Dark Ale and received it on the house. Mick winked as he set it down. ‘First one from the keg,’ he said. The beer was rich, burnt and smooth with an understated bitterness. Simply, it was easy to drink.
When Darrell finished his wine, which perhaps took longer than it should’ve, he beckoned for us to follow.
He is a short man, maybe 55, carrying no weight. Wearing prescription sunglasses, it is hard to see his eyes but not hard to read his affable nature. Softly spoken, in a slow, sad manner that left his company feeling obvious sympathy, Darrell was funny without meaning it. He wore a t-shirt advertising the Oyster Bay Blues Festival, 2000 and looked more like a surfer than a hippie, though he could’ve passed for both. His white beard was bushy, long and neat, the moustache stained yellow from smoking.
‘I used to live in that house with my partner,’ Darrell said, pointing at a stone house next to the brewery, also made from stone. ‘I’ve had all sorts of personal issues.’ He didn’t say where he lived now.
Two Combi vans were parked out front of his brewery, which was housed in an old shed originally built in the 1860s. Wheat Store was painted boldly above the unlocked roller door, which is why we couldn’t find the brewery. It was cool inside. The interior walls were painted white over a rough rendering job. The timber trusses were original, though the ceiling was insulated and the roof new. Once filled with sacks of grain, if the stainless steel vats, cold room and other brewing equipment were removed, the shed would still look original. Nothing much has changed in Greenock, it seems, in centuries.
I could not have guessed the Barossa Brewing Company would be without a cellar door or beer already bottled. Darrell was not kidding when he suggested we needed to help if we wanted it.
He showed Kristine how to roll labels onto the stubbies. She proved adequate, frowning in deliberation as she turned the handle. Darrell told her to hurry up. Opening the cold room, he rolled out a keg of lager and set it next to tap, connecting the gas. Gathering the stubbies from Kristine, he rinsed them to get rid of any remnant glass, filled them then sent them into the press.
The bottle press is a relic from a more primitive age. German built in 1915, Darrell imported it into Australia some years ago, and, as he said, spent some money on it. No one else in the country has one. The press doesn’t work on with an assembly line, bottles are hand fed, but it’s quick and precise, lifting the bottle up rather than a spike coming down.
The brewery isn’t huge, just one vat. Darrell doesn’t brew much by design, keeping the annual output to about 30,000 litres. ‘If I make more than that I have to pay excise,’ he said. ‘The government lets the vineyards make a million litres before excise but they do nothing to help the breweries. Then I pay GST on top of that.’
He provided kegs to the tavern across the road, rented kegs locally for parties and sold his beer online but kept his output low. The brewery did have a shop attached, but issues with his partner and having to work another job kept it shut.
Darrell made all the equipment except for the press, the label roller and a machine that filled and capped stubbies. He’d done an impressive job. ‘I’m an engineer by trade,’ he said. ‘I make things for the wineries.’
He seemed a man who loved beer but no longer found fun in the making, giving me a glass of lager without fuss, almost like a man offering a glass of water, perhaps figuring I didn’t need to hear about its characteristics or the way it was made. Rather, he wanted to discuss issues with the ex, I’ve had some difficulties, before showing us how to fold the six pack holders. Kristine and I packed the carton.
The Barossa Brewing Company website states the beer is unfiltered. I prompted Darrell about his methods. ‘I brew the lager at about 12 degrees for eight to ten days then chill it at four degrees for a month. It’s definitely not filtered.’
All the sediment settles to the bottom. The beer is then siphoned into kegs and stored in the cold room. I lifted the carton, a mix of lager and dark ale and thanked him. ‘Treat it like milk,’ Darrell said.
We had the complete Barossa Brewing Company experience. The carton cost $70, and as beer goes, it might be worth most of that. Visiting his brewery was worth so much more. Darrell, though, gave the impression he was unwilling to find new markets for it, which shows how troubled some people’s lives can become. He was clinical in making our carton, but lacked the enthusiasm to sell his beer to me.
He didn’t talk much about the brew, more about the equipment, the difficulties imposed by the government on boutique brewers, and why he had to keep his production beneath 30,000 litres annually. It seemed a harsh restriction. I asked about contacting the media to talk up the issues, something he’d already done. The government, he said, didn’t care.
Touring the Barossa Brewing Company was a unique experience. It seemed amazing Darrell had no lagers bottled, problems with the ex can do that. Thus, the beer is bottled on demand, and from Darrell’s demeanour and the government’s impositions, it’s a slow turnover. The beer though, is guaranteed to be fresh.
If Darrell could find a way to open his brewery more often to the public he might have to increase his output. Few people ever get the chance at the full brewing experience. It is my favourite memory of the Barossa.
Carton in the car, having consumed red wine and beer all day, I had long ago acceded the car keys to Kristine and we began the long drive out from the Barossa Valley, back through Adelaide and down to Cape Jervis. The drive was made longer by congestion, traffic thick and slow, and a lack of local knowledge. There may have been a quicker way to Cape Jervis but it hardly mattered when we arrived.
I had cold beer from the Barossa Brewing Company. The Miller’s Lager is 5 percent alcohol, the dark ale 4.4 percent. I had a good night…
