For two weeks we have been rambling through New Zealand’s south island, zigzagging from Christchurch to Queenstown, back to Dunedin and down through the Catlins to Invercargill, west to Lake Manapouri and Milford Sound, north to Cromwell and over to the west coast glaciers via Wanaka and the Haast Pass. With glee and boundless enthusiasm, we have discovered a abundance of orchards and vineyards, wonderful friends and picturesue towns, fur seals and flightless birds, and some truly ‘majestical’ scenery. At each place we stopped, we decided this was where we would live… and this… and this.
One unexpectedly successful stop was Cromwell, situated at the confluence of the two rivers, which has made it a hub, or rather a crossroads for the region. I realized this before reading it in the guide book after by-passing the town several times, en route to Queenstown from Christchurch, from Queenstown to Dunedin via Alexandra and Roxburgh, and from Arrowtown to Wanaka and the West Coast.
Cromwell was originally established during the gold rush of the 1860s. Later, as the gold ran dry, the area became known for its orchards and market gardens – which are still numerous – and later again as part of the Central Otago wine region. Today, the area is overflowing with luscious fruits and boutique wineries that thrive in the warm, dry climate. Across Bannockburn and the Cromwell Basin and along Lowburn Valley on the western banks of Lake Dunstan – which has proved a particularly successful locale for growing Pinot Noir grapes – we admire acres and acres of orchards and vineyards.
And Cromwell’s river banks are also the home of the only surviving population of Chafer Beetles in the world, which has led to the naming of a local wine: Beetlejuice Pinot Noir! But more of that later.
For a hundred and twenty years, Cromwell grew incrementally, but since the construction of the Clyde Dam in the 1980s – NZs second largest hydro-electric dam built downstream of the confluence of the rivers Clutha/Mata-Au and the Kawarau – and the subsequent creation of Lake Dunstan to the north, Cromwell has grown exponentially. This vast engineering project meant relocating the town centre and many of the town’s original buildings, so they would not be flooded by the new lake that would submerge 200 hectares of town and farmland. The Historical Precinct has preserved some of those historic buildings as museums, artisan businesses, cafes and restaurants.
Meanwhile, we have pitched camp at a lovely B&B on an established cherry orchard ten minutes south of Cromwell. Our welcome note invites us to wander at will and enjoy some of the produce grown in the greenhouses behind our studio room. Joyfully, we help ourselves to some tasty tomatoes, and fresh lettuce and herbs as needed. The One & Only is blissful – have I ever mentioned how much he adores tomatoes? Sometimes more than me! Also, our breakfast eggs have been laid by the chooks we can see from the back door, where Coco, a small, black and very polite young dog, quickly becomes a constant visitor.
We decided to use this lovely spot as a base for three nights while we explore the area and visit a winery or two, and there are plenty to choose from. En route to Arrowtown, a picturesque old mining town on the Arrow River, just north of Queenstown, we spot a familiar name. Chard Farm wines somehow found their way to Manila many moons ago, and I am inclined to revisit them in situ. We book a tasting for the following day, and in the meantime, I will track down one or two others…
Driving up the Kawarau Gorge we remark on the oddity of finding a Scottish Highland landscape in New Zealand, mixed with escarpment vineyards that remind us of the vineyards on the steep slopes of the Moselle, along the border of Luxembourg and Germany. The narrow track to Chard Farm, we later discover, was the original track between Cromwell and Queenstown, with a precipitous drop to the river below. From one look out point, we can see the original commercial Bungy jump off the Karawau bridge, where the kids are still bravely launching themselves towards the glacial blue waters 43 metres below. The grapes are almost ready to pick, but in the meantime, thy have been veiled in netting to prevent the birds from stealing the crop. The Chard family originally used this land as market gardens for feeding the miners panning for gold in the gorge below. It was converted to vineyards by vintner Rob Hay in 1987, and has grown into a substantial family-owned winery with six vineyards in the Cromwell basin and Gibbston region, specializing in Pinot Noir.
We reach the enormous wooden cellar door – the building resembles a Tuscan farmhouse – and introduce ourselves to Dominic, a softly-spoken wine lover who provides some beautiful and poetic descriptions, that make me wish I had recorded his spiel. We are not surprised to learn he is also a musician.
This region is ideal for Pinot Noir, we are told. This tiny and rather finicky dark red grape has a long list of prerequisites, like women searching for the perfect partner. If all its requirements are met, however, Pinot Noir will generously produce complex and elegant wines. Originally from Burgundy, the Pinot Noir grape has found another happy home in Otago, which apparently provides all the necessary conditions to satisfy this fastidious fruit, such as well-drained soils, long days of sunshine and cold, crisp nights.
Growing up on the full-bodied, ballsy reds and heavily wooded Chardonnays of South Australia in the 1980s, I have yet to develop an appreciation for the more subtle, flirtatious arts of Pinot Noir. In Otago, however, I have been re-educating my palate to good effect.
We begin with a Pinot Noir rosé, as Dominic describes the ‘layers’ of this ‘breakfast wine’. (Well, it is barely 11am.) This Maria Rosé 2023 is a dry, Provençal style rosé, left only briefly on the skins to give it a mere blush of colour. The flavour? Fresh berries with hints of lemon sorbet.
As he pours us a 2023 Swiftburn Sauvignon Blanc, Dominic talks of tropical aromas such as lychees and passionfruit, and similar clean, crisp flavours with a burst of gooseberry. To my delight, there is definitely lighter touch of herbage (which I think of as lawn cuttings), than an Australian Sauvignon Blanc offers.
Finla Mor Pinot Noir 2022 is hand-picked pinot at its best, and I am not the only one to notice, it seems! Complex, provocative aromas and flavours include plums and black cherries, with a certain peaty smokiness due to having spent some time in new oak. Dominic calls it grumpy; an earthy wine with attitude, and a savoury twist of black pepper. He describes it as an autumnal wine, one to be drunk in a large leather armchair. We try other Pinot Noirs, but this remains my favourite.
When we reach the end of the official tasting, I plead to try the Chardonnay before we go. Chard Farm produces two Chardonnays: the 2023 Closeburn, fermented in a steel tank, and its companion, Judge & Jury. This has been named for two rocky peaks across the river, and has been lightly aged in Acacia wood barrels. No prizes for guessing my favourite!
Driving back down to Cromwell, we spot a new housing estate going up on the edge of town. To one side stands a huge and ancient spruce, known to locals as the Wooing Tree. It was almost cut down to make way for a new vineyard in the 1980s, but the owners gave it a stay of execution, and instead gave its name to that vineyard. Recently, most of the original vines have been transplanted down to the western edge of Lake Dunstan, but happily, the developers have allowed this piece of the town’s history to remain intact, and the Wooing Tree Winery has built a new cellar door and restaurant on the edge of town, beside a couple of remaining rows of Pinot Noir vines, and a view of the celebrated tree.
Here, we stop for a wine tasting and a lunch of sharing platters. The One & Only takes the red route, which meant a diet of pure Pinot, including the aforemnetioned Beetlejuice. I, on the other hand, get a mixed bag: a dry ‘Blondie’ blanc et noir bubbles to start (blanc et noir is a French term for a sparkling wine made from red pinot and white Chardonnay grapes); a lightly wooded 2019 Chardonnay; a surprisingly smooth 2024 Pinot Gris, a tasty Gewürztraminer and a late harvest of the same. I haven’t tasted a Gewürz wine in decades, and those South Australian versions I favoured in my youth now seem overly sweet and spicy. The Wooing Tree Gewürtz has only the mildest dash of sweetness. Even the late harvest dessert wine has laid on the sugar with a gentle hand, and, in my more savoury maturity, I find both eminently drinkable, and the perfect end to our Wooing Tree experience.
And all this to accompany a delicious lunch of salmon rillettes and toast, flavourful lamb koftas with olives and Greek salad, and a large bowl of kumara chips.
As we head homewards, we give a wave to the giant fibreglass fruit sculpture on the edge of town – a nod to Cromwell’s original orchards of apple, nectarine, pear and apricot. It may be missing the latest horticultural additions, such as a bunch of grapes, but then there are plenty of the real ones along the verge opposite, in front of Wooing Tree’s new cellar door.