Craft Beer in the Region: A Self-Drive Brewery Route

I don't drink beer. But I understand people who make things well, and the four breweries in this region make things well. Here's the self-drive route.

Photo: Michael Spencer, CC BY 2.0

The wine gets the headlines. It always has, since the first vines went in at Vasse Felix in 1967. But the brewing scene that's grown up alongside the wineries over the last twenty years is doing the same thing the early winemakers did: small operations, local water, properly engineered process, people who actually care.

I've been around long enough to watch the four main breweries below establish themselves. None of them are bandwagon outfits. Each has its own room, its own food, its own rhythm. If you wanted to do all four in a day, you could (Busselton to Eagle Bay is forty minutes), but I wouldn't. Two breweries in a day, with a meal at each, is enough. Three is a long day. Four is a Sunday wasted.

What follows is the route I'd run, north to south.

A fair question. The answer's the same as why I write about cellar doors and chocolate makers. Anyone doing something properly in this region runs on the same logic I run my bench on. Pick the right material, take the time, don't cut the corner. That's true whether you're hopping a pale ale or fitting a drawer.

I drink wine. I drink it with lunch most days. But I've stood in three of these four brewery rooms more times than I can count, because that's where visitors want to go, and the rooms are good even if you're nursing a cider. So here's what I know.

Rocky Ridge is the newest of the four and the most ambitious. They're on a working farm out near Jindong, twenty minutes inland of Busselton, and they grow some of their own ingredients on site. The brewery taproom sits in a converted shed surrounded by paddocks and the brewer's family has been farming this land for generations.

The beer is the most experimental of the regional lot. They do a core range of well-built session beers and then a rotating wall of specials: barrel-aged stouts, sour ales, hop-forward IPAs, the kind of stuff that beer-nerd friends of mine drive down from Perth for. The taproom is dog-friendly, family-friendly, and the food trucks they bring in are dependable.

Rocky Ridge is the brewery that takes the most planning to get to. It's not on the way to anywhere. But if you've only got one brewery in you for the trip and you want the most interesting beer, this is the one. Check opening hours before you drive out. They're not seven days.

Eagle Bay Brewing is on Eagle Bay Rd, ten minutes from my workshop and just inland from Eagle Bay beach. It's the brewery I send most first-time visitors to, because the setting does a lot of the work. The room is open, light, with a deck that looks out over the vines (yes, vines — they make wine too) and rolling country beyond.

The beer is well-made and the lineup is broad enough to suit most palates. They do their own wines and a non-alcoholic option, which is more than most breweries bother with. The kitchen is the real reason to come. Wood-fired pizzas, share plates, a kids' menu that doesn't insult anyone, and a Sunday roast in the cooler months that's worth the booking.

Photo: undefined · via Wikimedia Commons

Eagle Bay is busy. Book ahead. In peak season they fill weeks out for weekend lunches. The deck on a warm afternoon is one of the better places to be in this region, and they know it.

the Eagle Bay day-trip route for how to fold it into a fuller day.

The Cowaramup Brewing Company sits just off the main street in Cowaramup town, thirty minutes south of Yallingup on Caves Rd. The brewery is in a converted shed with long timber benches inside, a fire in the corner in winter, and a grass area out the back where the kids play.

It's the most relaxed of the four. No deck with a view, no destination-restaurant ambitions. A working brewery, a beer garden, a wood-fired pizza menu, and a bar that gets the order out promptly. The locals come here, which is the best sign you can give a country pub.

The beer lineup is honest. A pale ale, a lager, a stout, a wheat beer, and a rotating handful of seasonal releases. Nothing fancy. Properly built and properly served. If you're driving the Caves Rd route between wineries, this is the lunch stop that breaks up the afternoon without overcommitting you to another formal sit-down.

Cowaramup town and what else is worth a stop for the bakery and the surrounding wineries.

The Brewhouse sits on a back road south of Margaret River town, surrounded by bush. It's the most rural-feeling of the four breweries. The taproom is in a big timber-framed room with a deck looking into the trees, and the kitchen runs a fairly standard pub menu with a few good house specials.

The beer is solid. Their pale ale and lager are the dependable choices and the seasonal range covers most styles. The Brewhouse is also good for kids — there's a playground, room to run, and a Sunday afternoon family vibe that doesn't get in the way of the adults.

Of the four, the Brewhouse is the one I'd describe as the most "pub and food garden" rather than the most "destination craft brewery". That's not a knock. It's the right call for an end-of-weekend wind-down lunch. I've recommended it many times for that exact use.

If you wanted to do this as a route, here's the order I'd run it. Pick two breweries, not all four. The drives between them are the rest of the day.

1. 10am

   Cape Naturaliste lighthouse

   Start the day with the walk. Forty minutes out and back to Sugarloaf. Builds the appetite.
2. 12pm

   Eagle Bay Brewing Co

   Lunch on the deck. Wood-fired pizza, a tasting paddle if you're staying, soft drinks if you're driving. Allow ninety minutes.
3. 2.30pm

   John Streater Fine Furniture, Blythe Rd

   Ten minutes from Eagle Bay. Workshop viewing, gallery, kettle on. Half an hour to walk the cool concrete and the timber walls between beers.
4. 3.30pm

   Cowaramup Brewing Company

   Late afternoon at the second brewery. A half-pint if you're not driving, a coffee if you are. Watch the kids run around the back grass.
5. 5pm

   Smiths Beach

   Sunset on the sand. Twenty minutes from Cowaramup back to the coast.

If your day starts further south, run it Rocky Ridge → Brewhouse → home. If you're staying in Dunsborough, run it Eagle Bay → Cowaramup → home. Don't try to fit Rocky Ridge and Eagle Bay in the same day. They're at opposite ends of the region and the drive between them eats into the lunch.

The gallery sits between Eagle Bay Brewing and Cowaramup on Blythe Rd. Ten minutes from one, fifteen from the other. Coming back to Yallingup from Cowaramup: Bussell Hwy, turn at the Carbunup store, then Blythe Rd. Google sometimes tries to send you via Wildwood. Don't take it.

This is craft beer in a region with very few public transport options. The realistic options for getting around are:

• A designated driver. Most groups I see do this. Rotate it through the trip if you've got a few in the car.
• A tour operator. There are a handful of regional brewery tour companies. The good ones do small groups and let you taste properly. The cheap ones bus you through four places too fast.
• Stay close. If you've got accommodation in Yallingup, Dunsborough or Cowaramup, you're within ten or fifteen minutes of two breweries minimum. Stay put, walk or short-cab, drink properly.

Drink-driving down here gets you a long walk home and a longer set of consequences. The local police are not interested in your weekend story. Plan the driving honestly.

Photo: undefined · via Wikimedia Commons

Quick summary, because it matters as much as the beer for most people:

• Rocky Ridge: rotating food trucks, often the best of the bunch but check what's on the day you go.
• Eagle Bay: full kitchen, pizzas and share plates, the strongest restaurant of the four.
• Cowaramup: pub-shed standard, wood-fired pizzas, burgers, schnitzels. Honest, generous.
• Brewhouse: standard pub menu with good house specials, the most family-friendly.

You won't go hungry at any of them. Eagle Bay is the only one I'd describe as a destination meal in its own right.

I won't pretend to be a beer expert. I'm not. But I've watched the brewing scene in this region grow up alongside the wineries, and the people running these four places are doing what the early winemakers did: putting the time in, doing it properly, building a room people want to come back to. That's worth supporting.

Pick two breweries. Drive sensibly. Eat at one of them properly. Then go to the beach. That's the day.

Photo: undefined · via Wikimedia Commons

the cellar doors with the best food if you'd rather lunch at a winery. the broader Dunsborough food picture for non-brewery dinner options after a brewery lunch.