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Media Coverage As a result of the Halliday Awards media release and a story pitch, GWN7 News reported on the exceptional results achieved by the Great Southern Wine Region.   Teapots and Everlastings in Ravensthorpe. Photo: Sue Leighton WA’s Golden Outback in bloom- show me the wildflowers
Western Australia’s Golden Outback is in bloom and it’s never been easier for visitors to see the rare and natural phenomenon with tours on offer and three wildflower shows confirmed. The Ravensthorpe Wildflower Show is the world’s largest show of its kind and includes a packed program of more than 20 workshops, events, talks and tours plus up to 700 wildflowers on display, all picked within the local shire by licensed and trained volunteers. Continuously run by volunteers since its inception in 1982, the Ravensthorpe Wildflower Show is a tribute to the rugged and natural beauty of the region that includes the nearby Fitzgerald River National Park and Ravensthorpe Range, collectively home to about 20 per cent of WA’s floral species including some that are, as yet, undocumented. The Ravensthorpe region has the most amount of Eucalypts in a given area and associate researcher and honorary curator of Eucalypts at the WA Herbarium, Malcolm French OAM, has stated it as "the Eucalypt Epicentre of the Universe with over 100 species and around fifty hybrids”. Ravensthorpe Wildflower Show coordinator Sue Leighton said that this year’s program is one of the best yet. “The program features our patron and well-known horticulturist Sabrina Hahn, travel journalist, photographer and author William Yeoman, a Hunt and Gather picnic with Mondo Butcher Vince Gareffa who’ll be hosting a sausage making competition, four-wheel-drive and two-wheel-drive tag-a-long tours, nature walks, guided walks with rangers, photography workshops, art workshops and exhibitions, Farm Gate Art trails, zoologists, geologists, botanists and so much more,” Sue said. Situated about 500 kilometres southeast of Perth, the Fitzgerald River National Park is a UNESCO listed World Biosphere Reserve, internationally recognised as being on par with the Galapagos and the Amazon, as quoted by Minister for Environment Stephen Dawson. The Fitzgerald Biosphere includes 1.5 million hectares of conservation estate, waters, farmland, industrial and urban areas and is considered to be one of the most diverse botanical regions on the planet with about 2,500 species and 175 endemic flowering plants that include Royal Hakea, Qualup Bell, Eucalyptus Sepulcralis, Weeping Gum, Pincushion Hakea, Woolly Banksia and Bottlebrush. Another nearby wildflower hot spot, about 200 kilometres east further along the coast is Esperance. The Esperance Wildflower Festival, held from 22nd to 26th September 2020, showcases about 500 wildflower specimens, art exhibitions from over 400 school students, cultural presentations by Nyungar Elders, keynote presentations from internationally renowned Australian botanists, displays from local organisations, an interactive community sculpture project, and more. This year’s theme is ‘flowers and feathers: friends or foes?’ which is a celebration of local plant and bird species and the important relationships between them. In Esperance, new operator Discover Esperance Wildflower Tours, offers day tours for up to ten people until the end of September that includes spotting the region’s incredible orchids. The 15th annual Reynoldson Reserve Wildflower Festival will be held from 30th October to 1st November at ‘The Station’ in Wongan Hills, about 185 kilometres northeast of Perth. The three-day program includes bus tours to spot wildflowers, horticulture talks, wildflower displays, a welcome sundowner, big breakfast, market stalls, Devonshire teas, art displays, vintage car show and demonstrations. There are several one-day and multi-day tours into wildflower country departing Perth with Casey Australia Tours, Villa Tours and Adams. For those preferring smaller and intimate tour groups (maximum of six people), Luxury Outback Tours offers a one-day tour into wildflower country and a seven-day tour from Perth to Katanning, Esperance, Hopetoun and Bremer Bay. In Beacon, about 300 kilometres northeast of Perth, wildflower tours run every Monday that includes carpets of Everlastings, Clown Orchids, Donkey Orchids, Dragon Orchids, Spider Orchids, Blue Fairy Orchid, Sandalwood Trees and various species of wattle, a campfire lunch with billy tea, honey tasting, and plenty of bird watching with regular sightings of Wedgetail Eagles, Budgerigars, Black Cockatoos, Purple Crowned Lorikeets, Major Mitchells and Malleefowl. There’s an opportunity to explore Billiburning Rock, climb to the top and look out over untouched land that stretches all the way to Mount Magnet. Wildflower season is underway and will run until November in the southern parts of WA’s Golden Outback. Covering over half of the ‘Wildflower State’, a road trip through WA’s Golden Outback rewards visitors with rare and magnificent sights. There are more than 12,000 species of wildflowers in Western Australia, of which more than 60 per cent are found nowhere else in the world. There are six wildflowers itineraries on www.roadtripcountry.com.au to guide travellers to wildflowers and a live wildflower tracker map, an excellent resource to see where the blooms are currently popping up. From 3rd August to 7th September, travellers spotting wildflowers can upload their photos to www.roadtripcountry.com.au/wildflowers for a chance to win a weekly $100 prize or the grand $500 prize. For more information on road trips to wildflowers visit www.roadtripcountry.com.au.  Pink and White Everlastings near Beacon, WA   Forest Hill Vineyard, Halliday 2021 Top Ten Best Value Wineries Halliday 2021 Awards: Great Southern Wines are Exceptional Quality and Value for Money
The 2021 Halliday Awards has recognised Great Southern wine producers for making exceptional wine across a number of varietals that offer incredible value for money. There were 111 Great Southern wines from 28 wineries that were awarded gold, 95 points or above, and of those, about half (49 per cent) were considered to offer special value for money. Forest Hill Vineyard was named in Australia’s Top Ten Best Value Wineries with 70 per cent of their ten wines that scored 95 points or more considered special value for money. Rating highest was their 2019 Block 1 Mount Barker Riesling at 98 points and is due for release this weekend at $55 a bottle. The Halliday website states, “The value all Forest Hill’s wines offer is exceptional, the style that of old money – another prime example of consistently extraordinary value. Six wines pointed between 96 and 98 points laid an irrefutable claim to inclusion near the top of the totem pole. Forest Hill has the early days of the Great Southern in its DNA.” Other big scoring wines include the 2017 Singlefile The Vivienne Denmark Chardonnay at 98 points which was also named in Australia’s Top Ten Chardonnay list, and Duke’s Vineyard 2019 Magpie Hill Reserve Riesling and 2018 Magpie Hill Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, both scored 98 points with another six of their wines awarded gold. Sixteen wines from Larry Cherubino Wines have been awarded 95 points or above with their 2019 Cherubino Great Southern Riesling rated highest at 97 points. Singlefile Wines has nine wines that scored 95 points or higher, eight wines from Rosenthal Wines, six wines from Frankland Estate, four wines each from Alkoomi, Castelli Estate, Harewood Estate, and Plantagenet Wines, and three wines each from Castle Rock Estate, Howard Park, Poacher’s Ridge Vineyard, Swinney, Terra Riche, and Xabregas have also been awarded gold at 95 points or more. Halliday’s Best of the Best 2021 Rieslings listed 13 Australian wines that scored 97 points or higher with six of those produced in the Great Southern. There were a further 31 Great Southern Riesling wines rated 95 points or higher with 68 per cent of Rieslings classed as offering value for money. Other varietals produced in the Great Southern rated as exceptional in Halliday’s 2021 Awards include 22 Shiraz wines, 20 Cabernet Sauvignon, nine Chardonnay, six Cabernet Blends, four Sauvignon Blanc, and two each of Malbec, Grenache, and Pinot Noir wines. Wine Australia’s industry snap shot shows that there are 65 wine regions across the country, 2,468 wineries and 6,251 grape growers that crush 1.73million tonnes of grapes per year. The Great Southern crushes about 12,000 tonnes of grapes per year, representing just 0.7% of Australia’s total crush. There are 32 five-star wineries in the Great Southern listed in the 2021 Halliday Awards, namely wineries that produce outstanding wines. The Great Southern wineries, of which there are 53, make up just 2.1% of all Australian wineries. For a full list of wines from the Great Southern in the 2021 Halliday Awards, click here. The Halliday website states that more than 9,000 wines have been reviewed for the 2021 Halliday Awards. More details of Great Southern Wine Region producers including those with cellar doors and restaurants can be found at www.greatsouthernwine.org.au. Forest Hill Vineyard owner and winemaker Guy Lyons: “Being named as one of the Best Value producers is great recognition for our team and for the hard work that goes into all our wines. Receiving 98 Points consecutively for our Block 1 wine was a real highlight and an acknowledgement of the uniqueness of the site.” “From a regional perspective, the results particularly exciting, the exceptional quality of the Rieslings across the board from the Great Southern but strength across many varietals.” Frankland Estate owner Hunter Smith: “We are delighted that our 2019 Poison Hill Vineyard Riesling was rated amongst the Best of the Best with a 97-point score and eight of our other wines scoring at least 94 points.” “Even though Halliday is considered to be the wine authority in in Australia, it’s worth noting that not every wine producer will send wines to every reviewer to sample, but what these results show is what we’ve known for years, that the Great Southern produces fantastic wines that are extremely competitive not just on quality, but also on price.” Plantagenet Wines general manager Tom Wisdom: “The 2021 Halliday Companion reaffirms the consistent and outstanding quality wine produced in the Great Southern Wine Region across a wide spectrum of varietals.” “From a Plantagenet perspective, our continued focus on premium cool climate Shiraz and Riesling is reflected in our Halliday scores achieved and we expect these wines to continue to evolve over the next 10 to 15 years. “Our luxury range, “The Wyjup Collection”, which we launched last year scored well and this September we look forward to our second release, including the 2018 Cabernet and 2018 Shiraz from what was an outstanding vintage and noted in the Halliday Companion as a ten out ten vintage for the Great Southern.” The Great Southern Wine Producers Association would also like to acknowledge the outstanding results of Western Australia’s winemakers and congratulates Leeuwin Estate for the award of Wine of the Year. Drink to greatness.  Plantagenet Wines |
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