Mintaro and Burra

We were both looking forward to our visit to historic Martindale Hall near Mintaro this morning. It's a living museum these days, allowing visitors a peek into what it was like in the days of gracious living on a large pastoral estate in the late 1800's to early 1900's (Martingdale Hall boasted 24 servants on staff, a polo ground, a racecourse, a boating lake and a cricket pitch where the English 11 played at least once, back in the day).

But Martindale Hall is most familiar to us because it was used as the "Appleyard Girls School" set in the iconic 1975 Peter Weir film "Picnic at Hanging Rock".

So we were all ready for our visit this morning...........

Only to be met with this ........ #!*#@

Even the kangaroos in the paddocks across the road looked like they felt sorry for us ........

The only alternative activity offered was a walk along a section of the Lavender Trail, back to the village of Mintaro - but taking the scenic walking trail meant  9.5 klm of walking (return)!

So we got back in the car and made our way back to Mintaro by road. This is what the surrounding landscape is like after early Autumn crops have been harvested ......... they call it dry land farming around here!

Our friend Wayne has a strong connection with the Magpie and Stump Hotel in Mintaro. His family ran the hotel  for a period over its long history (the pub was established in 1851).  We could see the hotel would have been in a great location back in the day - on one of the main carriage routes - as the colony was spreading northwards from Adelaide, seeking new grazing land and the promise of mining wealth.

Mintaro is an interesting historic village with great community spirit obviously. we strolled around its streets for a while admiring the old buildings. These buildings along Burra St date back to the 1850s. They would have been small shops in those days.

This one has been a carpenter's business, telegraph station (opened 1873), Post Office and general store - now in great need of repair!

We loved the way this old stone cottage in Young St is being renewed ..... especially the contemporary take on the traditional slate fence. There is a slate quarry very near the township (believed to be the oldest continuous operated slate quarry in SA, possibly Australia).

And the extension being constructed at the rear of the cottage using reclaimed timber .....

Further along Young Street there is a concentration of old churches (and schools). This little cottage was an "Anglican House & Chapel" back in the day (1856).

And this building was used as a licensed school from 1853 - 1872 ...........

And the larger of these two buildings was Australia's first United Methodist Church - it dominated religious life in the regional parish in its hey day.............

We ended off our walk around Mintaro with a wine tasting at Reillys Cellar Door opposite the Magpie and Stump Hotel. The winemaker is proud of his gentle, traditional winemaking processes using grapes from their proudly dry grown estate vineyards.............

We were very impressed with the Reillys 2011 Museum Riesling and the Old Bush Vine Grenache and bought a few bottles to add to our Clare Valley stash.

We drove about 35klm NE of Mintaro then on to historic Burra. This town began as a company mining (copper) township in 1851. Today it is a centre for its surrounding farming communities (grazing, wheat and vines) and is one of the best preserved towns from the Victorian era in Australia. Perhaps this is why quite a few Burra locations were used in the filming of the 1980 Bruce Beresford film "Breaker Morant".

We spent some time looking at the historic photographic collection in the beautifully maintained Burra Town Hall. 

Rob's pastoral heritage always shows when he sees anything to do with sheep, wool, shearers and outback dust! The Burra region was famous for its high quality merino wool right up until the mid 1900s when fine wool became a little less popular with the masses. There was a lot about the history of the merino in the Burra Town Hall collection.

The Burra Regional Art Gallery ......

This was the sweetest, best maintained railway station in north Burra (near the old mine). It no longer has trains (last train stopped here in 1992) but has been restored as a Visitor Centre and B&B.

Rob was very taken with the original tile work on these shops in Burra's main street....

So it was getting close to 3.00pm by the time we got back to our fave Watervale Hotel for another superb dining experience - to end off another lovely day in the Clare Valley.

This is what half a crisp skin chicken looks like on roasted kale and beetroot with herb butter (I couldn't finish it)... served with our now favourite Skillogalee Shiraz (flavours of plum and dark chocolate yum).

The owner of the Waterfall Hotel has a very strong background in South Australia's wine industry. There is a very serious wine list for diners to choose from. This is just one page from the wine list with just the Clare Valley rieslings on offer! 

We head back to Mildura tomorrow after a wonderful stay in the Clare Valley. Highlights for us have been staying in our beautiful lodge in Penwortham, having so many excellent food and wine experiences, seeing this amazing dry, tough but beautiful landscape and learning more about the settler history of the region.