Planning the Trip - The Wine Side of Things

So, with the musical matters covered, let's turn our attention to wine.

When the Merry Frockster turned up on the doorstep with the mail that had accumulated over the time we'd been away in Western Australia I wasn't expecting a copy of James Halliday's The Australian Wine Encyclopedia, but there it was, presumably as  a result of taking out a two-year subscription to Halliday's ubiquitous winery reference.

An encyclopedia isn't the sort of thing that you read from cover to cover, and I was browsing away quietly one afternoon when a reference to Steve and Rhonda Doyle of Bloodwood Wines, producers of a Rose called Big Men In Tights caught my eye.

I knew a Steve Doyle in Townsville in the early seventies, he had a girlfriend named Rhonda, and there was something about Big Men In Tights that seemed consistent with a sign advising visitors to leave their guns and bolsters outside when visiting a well known student residence at the top of a hill in West End.

But if you don't ask you don't find out.

Stranger things than discovering an acquaintance from JCUNQ is running a five star winery in Orange have been known to occur, and when it was confirmed that these were, the same people a detour into Orange was an obvious addition to the itinerary for any excursion towards Canberra.

In the meantime, predictably, we needed a chance to try the product, and a phone call provided an opportunity for a little catching up as well as delivering a mixed dozen to the Little House of Concrete in time for the summer festivities.

Given the seasonal considerations, half a dozen Big Men was an obvious starting point, and I'd rounded things out with three Rieslings, and one each of the Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz and the Maurice red blend.

The Maurice is still lurking in the rack, but with one of the Rieslings still lurking in the fridge, and the last Big Man In Tights accompanying us so it can be sprung on AFL-crazy acquaintances on the Gold Coast we'll be needing a resupply.

Which, of course, brings us to the potentially thorny question of where else to visit en route as far as wine is concerned. There are a number of issues here.

A quick run around the fingers produced a good dozen wineries I'm already buying from regularly, and there are limits to how much wine we can order and drink.

The first week of the trip, being centred around music, was, effectively Hughesy's time and Madam deserves a fair go, remembering that, left to himself, Hughesy would be quite content to ramble through a wine region, sampling as much of what was on offer as possible and prompting serious time issues for the driver.

If the winery in question has scenic aspects or other items of photographic interest, that isn't a problem, but a touring itinerary along the lines of Great Picturesque Wineries of New South Wales would still be a bridge too far.

Given the fact that I'd like to spend a bit of time catching up at Bloodwood, which is an overnight stop with the markets of Canberra beckoning on Sunday morning, once we decided to wait till after the Easter long weekend before heading south, that'll more than likely be it for Orange.

A check of the wineries in the Canberra District revealed many of them are closed Tuesday and Wednesday, so if you're arriving Sunday and leaving Wednesday, that only leaved Monday as a tasting day, with experience suggesting that anything more than four wineries in a day is pushing the envelope, that's probably going to be it in the tasting department.

There's a further factor to consider here.

A glance at the websites suggest small wineries with limited ranges, so it might be possible to stretch things a little, particularly when lunch is thrown into the equation. Local knowledge will be of paramount importance, and, fortunately, we'll be able to access some, in the form of the inimitable form of my long-lost former colleague.

Getting Started - Musical Considerations

One of the problems of sharing a domicile with someone who's a keen photographer and is into taking pictures of various forms of vegetation is the unwillingness of the North Queensland climate to throw up anything significant in the way of seasonal variation.

There's the old wet season - dry season dichotomy, of course, and the rain forest is almost invariably green, with plenty of worthy subject matter under the verdant verges, but for seasonal variation you really need to go somewhere where it actually gets cold, as in real cold, not the week some time between early May and late August when the mercury plunges into single figures.

Which explains the decision to set out in April and head as far south as Canberra.

Now, if it was left entirely up to me, the travel arrangements would be based around concerts, wineries and the odd social call, but there are other interests involved, so I tend to put in my two bob's worth, hand over responsibility for the rest of the itinerary and then see what I can squeeze in around Madam's agenda.

With Easter relatively late this year we had the option of going before or after the holiday period, which also happens to contain Bluesfest at Byron Bay, so while we weren't likely to be going to Byron itself, there was the possibility of catching some of the acts elsewhere either before or after the long weekend.

The problem is they don't announce all the acts at once, and even when they announce a bundle of new names they don't announce all the associated tour details at the same time.

From mid-December the 2011 lineup looked pretty damn good, and the prospect of catching some subset of Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi, Robert Randolph, Elvis Costello, Irma Thomas, Trombone Shorty (to pick out a tranche of the most likely suspects) had me licking my chops and waiting for further details, which came in the form of Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi with Robert Randolph as the support act at Sydney's Enmore Theatre on April 21.

Tickets were duly bought, and we sat dow to wait for further announcements, which failed to appear before Madam emerged wanting to know when we could start booking flights.Predictably, we'd booked seats to and from Sydney for Derek, Susan and Robert, arriving the day before the show and heading back on Good Friday, when they announced Elvis Costello & The Imposters playing Sydney on the Tuesday.

Madam's not a big Elvis fan, and had seen him once (solo) but investigations revealed it wasn't that difficult to bring my booking forward twenty-four hours, so adjustments were made, and I was off to see EC.

With this year's Anzac Day coinciding with Easter Monday, which is already a public holiday, the Easter long weekend got stretched a day longer, and the regular five day Bluesfest blew out to six.

Those changes had to be approved, however, and once they had been there was another announcement of artists which included Little Feat, who turned out to be playing Sydney on Good Friday, Byron Saturday and Sunday and Melbourne on Monday, all of which looked like candidates for the too hard basket since we'd have to change flights again, stay an extra night at long weekend rates if we wanted to catch the Feat in Sydney since Saturday and Sunday at Byron were already sold out.

Still, I thought, the band would arrive in Sydney Wednesday or Thursday, when we would be there, and there might be some possibility of saying G'day. A polite inquiry emailed to Bill Payne produced news that the road manager would be in touch, but as I sit tapping these notes out in a Gladstone motel room, that hasn't happened, so it's a case of wait and see.

Anyone ordering about this apparently mystifying connection between a retired music fan in Bowen and Little Feat is pointed to a brief spell between 1998 and 2000 when I administered the band-approved Highway 95 tape and CD tree, a permanent structure for distributing amateur concert recordings. that was part of a conscious attempt to set up a grass roots support movement for the band, who've flown under the radar of commercial success for most of the past forty-plus years,

Those matters were something I was keen to have a yarn about if I managed to catch up with Bill Payne or Paul Barrere, but with the band's schedule (play Sydney Friday night, Byron 2:30 Saturday and Sunday afternoons and Melbourne Monday night) I wouldn't be holding my breath, would I?

On the other hand they have to arrive in Sydney some time, and that some time is likely to be while we're there, so there might be a possibility in that direction.

Whether the largesse directed towards artists playing an early afternoon slot at Bluesfest is substantial enough to include passes for hangers-on to get into the festival or gain access to the backstage area is a pretty dubious proposition, but:

(a) if you don't ask, you don't get;

(b) I'm a member of the Former Bowlers' Union (Extremely Limited Talent Section), so I'm no stranger to asking, even if you don't get many opportunities; and

(c) if there was a chance of getting into an event that has already been sold out for free to see Little Fear, Mavis Staples, Irma Thomas, the Blind Boys of Alabama with Aaron Neville, Robert Randolph & The Family Band, Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi fronting the new Tedeschi Trucks Band you'd be asking, wouldn't you?

But that outlines the musical side of the itinerary, giving the sort of detail that can be avoided when the concert reviews roll around, and if the opportunity to extend the musical aspect of the next eight days (he said, tapping away in Gladstone around 5:30 on a Sunday morning) that'll be more grist for the mill over at The Little House of Concrete Music.