An oasis of beer in a desert of wine

We had fun, times three, over the Christmas holidays. Sweetie one and I were fortunate to have sweetie two join us for the holiday season. My big guy winged his way over and after a very long flight, one piece of luggage that didn't want to come along for the trip until a day later, and lots of confusion at the airport we were all reunited as a family. Happy times!

While the funk of jet lag wore off for cutie two, we played in Jakarta, rode the Scoopy and Ninja, ate yummy food, visited the gem market, checked out the mall Christmas decorations, floated in the pool and just enjoyed each others company.

On Christmas Day, we opened a few gifts and then went to the Dharmawangsa Hotel for a Christmas Buffet. The Dharmawangsa (Dharma (just like charm but with an uh sound at the end)- wong - suh)is a very nice older hotel in South Jakarta. The buffet was quite good and they had a very cute, tropical Santa wandering around with a pack slung over his back from which he handed out toys to the kids in attendance. They also had a musical group performing Christmas songs on the patio. It was all very relaxing and fun.

As the afternoon wore on, we had to make sure we were packed and ready for a very early departure from Jakarta to the land down-under the day after Christmas. Not only did I get the gift of us all being together, but we were doing a modified family road trip. Kind of.

We boarded a plane bound for Perth, Australia about the time the home side of the planet was eating an early Christmas dinner or late lunch. We had to make a "technical stop" in Bali which meant getting off the plane, walking through the Bali airport to a different gate and re-boarding after about 45 minutes. From there it was three and a half hours till touch down in Oz.

While in our mother-land it is Winter, in Australia it is Summer. That means the kids are out of school. Christmas equals riding a surfboard and going for a swim in the beautiful waters that surround this huge island to the south of Indonesia. Since the population and pollution are much less than Jakarta's, the sun was quite intense and the temperatures ran in the upper 90 degree range most of the week while we were visiting.

We arrived in Western Australia, collected our bags and went through immigration and customs. The idea is to drive south from Perth for about three and a half hours and arrive in the Margaret River area by dinner time. Just like the seasons, driving in Australia is opposite from what we usually do. That is to say we are now going to try our hand at driving a car on the left hand side of the road. Honey bun and I ride our scooter and motorcycle on the left in Jakarta, but neither of us has tried to drive something larger than a means of transportation with two wheels. However, with the three of us to keep our eyes open for road signs, highway numbers, following the basic navigation app we downloaded to my iPad, and stray kangaroos we were ready for our down-under experience.

Australia has these clever round abouts that took a little getting used to. I guess they are showing their European roots with this system. This also gave sugar pie practice with the turn signal, staying on the left and figuring out which spoke he was supposed to be aiming for. I say practice with the turn signal because more times than not, sweetie number one would inevitably turn on the windshield wipers instead of the signal. This became pretty much standard practice every time we got in the car. Get in the car. Seat belts on. Engine on. Back out of parking space. Drive to corner to make a turn and oops; there go those pesky wipers. It provided a constant source of entertainment, and to some degree betting as to which one he would activate - the signals or the wipers. Sorry honey. We bet on the wipers most of the time. Love you. *Addendum - after I read my blog aloud to my sugar he asked that I please note that the turn signal and the windshield wipers are located in reverse on the steering column to what we are used to. There you go honey. A note has been made.

We arrived at our destination all in one piece and had a delicious dinner at our lodging. Where we were staying, there were lots of Karri trees. They are attractive trees; tall with light colored bark. Our host told us that most folks don't like to hang out under the Karri trees very long because the termites find them attractive too. That means large limbs are prone to fall off without warning. Keep that in mind if you ever visit Australia.

There are all kinds of birds calling as evening begins to settle in. There are the great imitators - the magpie as well as kookaburos, what I think are lorakeets, and what appears to be warblers of some type. Also at dusk and dawn the kangaroos come out. Yes, the unusual looking animals are just like deer roaming around in the fields, the edge of the woods and brushy areas. They are very timid and take off at the slightest movement.

As usual, I am working my way to the reason that prompted me to title my post the way that it appears. Margaret River is one of the wine producing areas of Australia. There is also a fair amount of cattle, goats and sheep raised here. Therefore, you find cheese and ice cream to be a source of pride for the region along with wine. But we didn't go that route. Nope, sweetie two has decided to learn to make his own beer, meade, and ciders as a hobby. Therefore, part of our visit to the area was to check out the micro-brewery scene. One of these brew houses used the motto "An oasis of beer in a desert of wine." Well, there you have it. So let's get on with the rest of this tale.

We mapped out the breweries that we wanted to visit and mixed them in with other sight-seeing activities. It was such a refreshing change to have so little traffic, eye popping blue skies, magnificent blue water, clean air and some really tasty beverages to boot. We visited brew houses in Margaret River, Freemantle, and Perth. Each one was different and each one was enjoyable. We walked along beaches, visited lighthouses, walked on city streets, poked around in shops, tried out the local cuisine, toured museums, saw kangaroos and just soaked up Aussieness.

At the micro-breweries, one of the first sthat struck us was that almost all had playgrounds, or play areas and green space. Entire families would arrive and those with kids would sit out at the tables on the grass so the kids could run around, climb on the playground equipment or play in the sand box. Now I haven't been to any breweries like that in the US. Maybe I have missed them, but I don't think so.

The second thing that struck us was that we were no longer towering over the population as we do in Jakarta. A large percentage of the people we saw were our height or taller. Sweetie two is a pretty tall Texan and he even looked short compared to a few of the Aussie men we saw. Must be all of that fresh air.

We also noted that the large majority of the population wear hats when they are out and about. They are serious about sun protection. Since the sun is very intense, and they don't have the SPF30 pollution sunscreen we have in Jakarta, they cover up. However, since many of the hats were very cute short-brimmed numbers perhaphs it is to just keep your head from frying.

The food was predictable at some of our stops. Typical pub grub. Hamburgers and pizza. However, the hamburgers still had a down-under twist. Atop your burger was lots of lettuce, shredded carrots, sliced pickled beets, tomato, maybe grilled onions, a dab of mayo, and a touch of bar-b-que sauce. Now don't go all eeewwwww on me. No pickles and no catsup seem like a major crime all on their own. But pickled beetroot (as they like to call it) and shredded carrot??? It was actually pretty tasty. We ate several burgers prepared that way and enjoyed them quite a bit.

Our tour went from very up-scale to very not up-scale brewing establishments. The very not up-scale place was actually the most fun. We pulled up late in the afternoon; about 4:10 to a place called the Bush Shack. This brewery was supposed to be representative of a bush shack (surprise) out in the Australian Outback I think. We drove around and I really didn't think we should get out. Its rough facade was a little too authentic looking. However, this was why we were here so we got out. It was probably our favorite place. We missed the food service, it ended at four, but the offerings looked really interesting and I hate we missed out. The beer was very good and well crafted. The staff was so friendly. In fact, I was about to take a picture in the bar area and they invited us behind the bar and I handed over my camera to one of the staff. In the photo, we all looked like we were pulling the taps and serving some brews. Thanks guys. It was a great afternoon.

As we drove around Margaret River, we observed signs that said, "Who's your skipper?" I liked that. What a colorful way to ask you if you have a designated driver. Good advice anywhere you are.

We also observed tour buses for both the wineries and the micro-breweries. Two of my favorites were "Wine Tours for Dudes" and "Margie's Big Day Out." I think we could have called ourselves "Two Dudes and a Mom Beer Tour" or "Sweeties Big Day Out." Whatever we called ourselves, we had a great time.

We visited chocolate shops, did a speed tour of a cheese shop - totally different story that would make no sense unless you were there, watched kite-surfers, wind surfers, surfer surfers having so much fun in a sea the color of aquamarine that you just wanted to jump in a give it a try. All of this before we made our way north, back to Perth.

We spent two nights in Perth and after a long day of walking we retired to the hotel and turned on the TV. There was a cricket match being televised. The Perth Scorchers versus the Brisbane Heat. I kid you not. It was a sell out crowd in attendance. The really odd part was that it was being held about a mile away from our hotel as we could see the lights on the field. We watched the match and tried to figure out what was going on. Shockingly enough, we found that it was pretty interesting and we had a good time watching. Would have been even better to see it in person. While we were watching the action, we realized that who we thought were three announcers were actually two announcers talking to the "bowler" who was wearing a microphone while he was playing. Imagine the announcers have conversations with Eli Manning while he is out on the field quarterbacking? We were amazed.

We visited one last brew house in Perth and it was the most up-scale. It was good, but after the Bush Shack life just wasn't the same. So, on New Year's Eve we turned in our car, headed to immigration (where by the way we had a delightful chat with the immigration officials as there was practically no one else in the airport), and then off to the gate we went.

Sunny Australia was fun and we feel truly blessed that we were all able to share it together. May you, and those you love have some time to spend together soon. No brewhouse necessary.