Voyager Estate: Before and After

Voyager Estate sits at the far end of the wine region from where I live, and that's part of what makes a day down there worth planning properly.

It's a forty-five minute drive from Yallingup down to Voyager. That's not far in the scale of things, but it's far enough that you don't want to drive down for lunch and then turn around and drive straight back. You want to make a day of it. Otherwise you're spending more time in the car than you are anywhere worth being.

Photo: Lasthib, CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

You can book lunch at Voyager Estate through their site. The Discovery menu is the one most visitors take. Aim for a 12 or 12:30 booking and the rest of the day works around it.

This is a post about the before and after. The lunch I'll let them speak for. The drive there and the drive back are what I want to talk about.

Don't take the highway down. Or rather, take Bussell Hwy as far as the Margaret River town turnoff and then drop south on Caves Road. The extra fifteen minutes is the difference between getting somewhere and arriving somewhere.

Caves Road runs through karri forest in patches, marri and jarrah country in others, and across paddocks where the morning fog sits low until about 10am in autumn. Driving down in the morning, leave early enough to do this stretch with the light coming in sideways through the trees. It's free. It's the kind of thing that puts you in the right frame for a long lunch.

One quick stop on the way: pull in at Hamelin Bay or Boranup Forest for ten minutes. Boranup is the karri stand. The trees there are the tallest you'll see in the South West and they're worth standing under for a few minutes before you sit down for two and a half hours. Hamelin is the calm-water bay for a swim. Pick one. Don't try for both before lunch.

Photo: Vasse Felix, CC BY-SA 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

By the time you turn into Voyager's gates you'll have driven through enough country to remember why you came. The lunch lands better when you've earned it.

Drink less than you think you should.

I say this as someone who's eaten there a few times. The wine list is serious, the food is the kind that's tempting to pair properly, and you've got an hour and a half drive home afterwards if you're heading back to Yallingup the long way. The Discovery menu does the wine for you in small pours, the sensible move for a driver.

One nominated driver, half-pours on the matched wines, water in between, and you'll come out of lunch happy rather than half-asleep. The afternoon is the second half of the day. Treat it that way.

This is where most people get it wrong. They take Bussell Hwy back because it's faster, and they miss the entire point of being down there.

Come back via Caves Road. Not the same stretch you drove in on. Keep going north through Witchcliffe, past the chocolate company, and back into Margaret River town. From there, depending on how the afternoon is going, you've got three options.

Caves Road runs through country you don't see from the highway. The fifteen extra minutes is the whole reason to be down there.

Option one is to keep going north on Caves Road through Wilyabrup, past most of the major wineries (Vasse Felix, Cullen, Howard Park) and out the other side toward Yallingup. The light through the late afternoon along that stretch is the part of the region the brochures don't quite capture.

Option two is to detour west to Canal Rocks for the sunset.

Photo: Lasthib, CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

Option three is to head straight back, drop the bags, and walk down to Yallingup beach for the last hour of the day. That's what I'd do if I were tired. The beach does most of the work for you.

Canal Rocks at sunset

Heading north on Caves Road in the late afternoon, the workshop is a few minutes off the road. Blythe Rd, Yallingup. Solid jarrah walls and southwest limestone. I built the whole thing in 1988 with my own hands, and it's still where I work every day.

Gallery on the route back north. Blythe Rd, Yallingup. Most people drop in around 4 or 5 in the afternoon after a day south. The workshop's still going, Pamela's usually there, kettle's on. Google Maps sometimes misdirects via Wildwood Rd — stay on Bussell Hwy, turn at the Carbunup store, then Blythe Rd.

A lot of the pieces in there came from forests not far from the road you just drove down. Marri tabletops, jarrah benches, sheoak side tables: the country between Yallingup and Voyager grew most of it, and there's something about visiting both ends of that wood-and-wine country in the same day that makes the trip stick.

the local wineries write-up

People often ask me whether Voyager or Vasse Felix is the better lunch. It's the wrong question.

routes for after the long lunch

Vasse Felix is the older place, the original Margaret River winery, and the food is on the gentler, more art-and-architecture side. Voyager is grander, the gardens are formal, and the cellar door is built to make a statement. They're both excellent. They're not trying to be the same thing.

With two lunches to plan in a long weekend I'd do Vasse Felix on the first day to settle in and Voyager on the second day to mark the trip. With only one, I'd pick based on which end of the region I wanted to wake up at.

Photo: David Stanley, CC BY 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

the Yallingup-to-Margaret-River drive

The best lunches I've had down there weren't the ones where I tried to do too much before or after. They were the ones where the drive was part of the day, the lunch was unhurried, and the road home gave me half an hour of late light to think the meal over. Voyager rewards that. So does the road.

Drive slow. Drink less. The country does the rest.