Samuel Smith migrated from Dorset England to Angaston in the colony of South Australia circa 1847, he took up work as a gardener with George Fife Angas, the virtual founder of the colony. In 1849, Smith bought thirty acres and planted vines by moonlight, the first ever vintages of Yalumba. One of his most enduring legacies were some unique clones of Shiraz, which were ultimately sown to the illustrious Mount Edelstone vineyard in 1912. Angas's great grandchild Ron Angas acquired cuttings from the Edelstone site and migrated the precious plantings to his pastures at Hutton Vale. The land remains in family hands, a graze for flocks of some highly fortunate lamb. In between the paddocks, blocks of Sam Smith's experimental vines yield a harvest of the most.. The return of rootstock to garden of eden»

Graeme Melton and a mate were travelling across South Australia in 1973, their EH Holden was in dire need of maintenance and Graeme took up casual work at a passing winery. The site supervisor was Peter Lehmann and young Graeme had his epiphany on the road to Barossa Valley. Lehmann suggested that Graeme change his name to Charlie and take the pilgrimmage to Vallee Rhone. Charlie became prepossessed with the culture of old vines Grenache, Shiraz and Mourverdre. He returned to the Barossa, at a time when old vineyard fruit was made into flagon Port and growers were destroying their historic sites in return for government grants. Charlie emabarked on a crusade to conserve and restore the ancient vines, establishing his cellars at Tanunda along Krondorf.. Melton makes a mean mourvedre»

There are four tiny patches of vine at Scotchman's Hill, which have been mollycoddled by Robin Brockett, since the start of his tenure as chief winemaker in the 1980s. Excruciatingly limited after a strict pruning and rigorous sorting of fruit, they each yield a mere hundred cases of wine. Brockett has set aside the precious harvests of these superior blocks for his own label, a personal project to hand craft the finest of vintage, an exclusive range of the Bellarine's most elite single vineyard efforts. So besotted is Brockett by the spectacular quality of fruit from these four regal parcels, he has imported two 800 Litre Tuscan vinification Amphora from the Brunello commune of Montalcino. Whole bunches and wild ferments in the like of ancient clay.. Brockett begets the best of bellarine»

Just three kilometres from Young along Murringo Road, planted to a brisk 500 metres above sea level, Grove Estate was originally sown to vines in 1886, by Croatian settlers who brought cuttings from their farms on the Dalmatian coast. Some of these ancient plantings, emigrated at a time when much of Europe was ruled by Hapsburg emperors, remain productive to this day. Newer blocks were gradually established around these priceless parcels, ostensibly with a view to supplying leading national brands. The quality of fruit became so conspicuous that Grove Estate sanctioned industry celebrities from Ravensworth and Clonakilla to begin bottling under their own estate moniker. The greater Hilltops region is renowned for elegantly structured Cabernet and Shiraz. Grove Estate go one better, they deliver.. Quiet consummations of grove estate»

Johann Gottfried Scholz served in the Prussian army as a battlefield bonesetter, before joining the great emigration of Lutherans from Silesia to Barossa Valley. After building a family homestead along the alluvial banks of Para River, Gottfried established a mixed farm of livestock and crops, fruit trees and grapevines, Semillon and Shiraz. His acumen at healing fractures and setting splints made Gottfried a leading local identity, as his homestead cottage evolved into the Barossa's very first private hospital. Over a century later, the exceptional quality of harvest from Gottfried's original homestead, made the fruit of Willows Vineyard, an essential component in the most memorable vintages of Peter Lehmann, Saltram and Kaiser Stuhl. Scholz are still in charge, pruning their vines and pressing their.. Savour the shiraz by scholz»

The Australian winemaking industry is grateful to Leontine O'Shea, instrumental in the establishment of Mount Pleasant wines, she sent her son Maurice to France for an education in viticulture right at the outbreak of World War I, gifting him his first Hunter Valley vineyard in 1921. Mount Pleasant are now custodians of some grand old sites, a canon of small, elite blocks of vine that yield a precious range of icon wines, which represent peerless value and readily disappear before release of the following vintage... The legacy of grand old hunter valley vineyards»