Dateline February 13, 2015, Lambert Estate, the Barossa Valley

From New Zealand to Australia.

We left Queenstown on an evening flight, had an overnight at the Auckland airport, then flew on through Melbourne to Adelaide, landing about 11 a.m. We picked up the rental car and pointed it at the Barossa Valley to visit Jim and Pam Lambert at Lambert Estate.

Old friends.

Jim and Pam have a lovely guest house called the Lambert Estate Retreat, at the vineyard in Angaston. We met Pam and Jim about eight years ago, when we had, with partners, a small online wine company that specialized in boutique wines from around the world. We had spent some time with them on their visits back to the United States, and visiting their winery had been one of the highlights of our last trip to Australia, in 2009.

A wonderful change this time around was the addition of their son Kirk and his new wife Vanessa as the winemakers. The business has truly become a family one. Kirk and Vanessa, originally from Peru, met while attending the University of Adelaide's wine science program.

When we arrived, Pam greeted us with open arms and we introduced Pete and Bunny. It turned out that Bunny had family who had been nuns at a Wisconsin convent that literally backed up to the farm Jim had grown up on. What a small world!

Changes at the estate.

There were a few changes since our last visit. One was a gas-powered contraption that makes noises to scare the birds away from the grapes. Another was the construction of a new winery and tasting room, more on that shortly. The Lamberts had also done new plantings and replaced some of the Riesling vines with Durif (petite sirah), which would take about five years to mature.

Four o'clock.

Pam gave us the keys to the Retreat and invited us back for cocktails and dinner at their home at four o'clock. The Retreat is a great full house, three bedrooms and two baths along with a washer and dryer. Fantastic. For guests at the Retreat, the four o'clock cocktail hour is a regular feature of most days of the week, and a chance to taste through some of the estate wines.

We started with a sparkling Chardonnay-Pinot Noir. Kirk and Vanessa had been changing the formulation of this sparkling wine, and the new 2014 had a reddish, rosé color to it and was spectacular. We followed with the Nordic Frost, a cold-pressed Riesling, very dry and typical of Australian Rieslings rather than the sweeter German style.

The new winery.

Glass in hand, we walked up to the new winery. The Lamberts were building the new winery and cellar door, which will include offices, conference areas, a VIP tasting area, and full catering facilities to service up to three hundred guests for a sit-down event or a wedding. Pam had brought along a bottle of their A Thousand Word Chardonnay, hand-pressed from estate-grown grapes, which was great.

The winery was not quite complete during our visit, but the walk-through, and what was planned for completion in April, meant we would have to return. One of the holding tanks alone could hold up to eighty thousand bottles of wine. Holy cow.

We came back to the house, having run out of wine.

Kingsley and Kathy.

At the house we met the Lamberts' friends Kingsley and Kathy. Kingsley used to own an earth-moving company, and although he is no longer in business, he was the one completing the excavation for the new winery, with much still to go. What a fun and delightful couple. Kingsley shared stories of his travels along Route 66.

The Australian BBQ.

Jim opened a bottle of Sparkling Shiraz that had been made as a private label for a client. The bulk of the wines at Lambert Estate are red varietals. Jim and Pam started bringing out the appetizers, which was the beginning of a wonderful Australian BBQ. We tasted, alright, we drank, through the various wines alongside sausage (multiple kinds), cheeses, and chicken wings, and on into dinner.

Jim slow-cooked pork on the barby, which was an old round Weber grill set inside a wine keg, allowing for a slow-cooked, smoked flavor. It was tender and fantastic. Pam prepared her Chinese noodles and bok choy salad with her secret sauce, which had been a favorite from our last trip and which we have unsuccessfully tried to duplicate at home. (One of the reasons is that the noodles are not available in the US.)

The wines.

We worked our way through the red wines as the meal went on. Three's Company is a beautiful blend of grenache, shiraz, and mourvèdre, with the eucalyptus influence that you taste in the best Barossa reds. Then the Forgive Me Zinfandel, very smooth and very good. Then onto what the Barossa is most famous for, the Cabernet Sauvignon and the Shiraz. The Thoroughbred Cabernet, always one of our favorites. The Commitment Shiraz, both full-bodied and wonderful.

Then the pièce de résistance: The Silent Partner Cabernet Sauvignon and The Family Tree Shiraz.

Words cannot describe these two wines. They can be put up against any wine in the world and hold their own. As a matter of fact, The Family Tree was once placed in a blind tasting against Penfolds Grange Shiraz, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Nine of the ten judges picked the Family Tree. Grange is widely considered one of the finest Shirazes available; a four-year-old bottle can fetch in excess of $400.

About thirteen bottles between the group later, it was time to crawl back to the Retreat.

Looking for kangaroos.

We woke early so John and Janice headed up the hill to see if we could find the kangaroos and the path through the vineyard to town. The Lambert Estate has nine kangaroos in residence. As we headed up the hill we saw two of them jumping, and then one turned around to look at us, before they were both off.

Janice's hip was a little tender, so we went back down the hill and drove to town to pick up coffee, tea, and eggs for breakfast. We spent the day in the villages around the Barossa, stopping in Angaston for afternoon coffee and tea and to borrow the cafe's internet.

A second evening, and the airborne kangaroo.

We drove back over to the Lamberts' for another four o'clock, starting again with the sparkling. Eventually we headed out for dinner, following Jim up through the vineyard. We got over the top of the hill, and there, off to our left, were five of the kangaroos.

John and Pete walked slowly toward them, clicking their cameras. Pete was the sneakier of the two and got fairly close.

The one with the kangaroo in the air was captured by Pete.

Dinner at the Wanera.

We carried on to the Wanera Wine Bar for dinner, where we drank some Silent Partner and some Family Tree alongside two of the best red wines you will ever taste. Dinner was fantastic.

On our last trip in 2009, we had enjoyed dinner here as well. This time we were served by the lovely young Abbey Wilson; with a name like that, we asked after her family.

Pokies.

After dinner Pam said we had to go play pokies, so we headed down the street to a small bar with pokies machines (slot machines, by another name). We started rolling. Bunny hit it big, winning over fifty dollars. Janice broke even. Pam lost a few. A great time was had by all.

Farewell to the Lamberts.

The visit with the Lamberts was just great fun. We wish them the best with finishing up the new winery and with the next chapter of the family business, as Kirk and Vanessa take on the winemaking and Jim and Pam continue to guide Lambert Estate forward.