Our Honeymoon at Rutherglen

Some of you may have read the post about our honeymoon over on Romancing the Genre's blog where I'm a contributor on the first Thursday of the month.  This week's blog is a re-post for my regular readers but with a video and some photos not seen before. Besides that there are extra details about what we did. Starting with the following little story.

As I was getting ready to on our wedding day, my sister asked if I'd told the B and B we were staying at that it was our honeymoon. When she heard I hadn't, she said I should make sure they know because they might do something a bit special for us. I sent them a text confirming our accommodation and expressing how much I was looking forward to spending our honeymoon  with them. The owners made an extra effort to make the rooms romantic. ​

​On Monday, we arrived at Carlyle House in the afternoon. The Victorian facade, with gables and verandas, was decorated with iron lace that set the tone for our romantic honeymoon. The owners greeted us and showed us through the ornate entrance hall to our suite. Carlyle House had once been a doctor's residence and we were staying in what had once been the consulting rooms, now converted into a lovely lounge, bedroom and en-suite. Named The Tokay suite it would be our base for the next four nights.

​On entering we were greeted with a white MR & MRS sign sitting on the fireplace and rose petals scattered on the hearth area. On the king size bed was a tray with champagne and chocolates and a little dish of blueberries and strawberries. After the romance of our wedding, our honeymoon suite didn’t disappoint.
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An extra piece of information, The Tokay suite with a lounge room was the same price as rooms that only had a bedroom and en-suite. For what we had it was very reasonable. 

The first evening we went to one of the pubs for dinner and enjoyed well-prepared staples. It was crowded in the pub and we enjoyed noticing who else was dining there.

​We began exploring the wine district on Tuesday. After a walk up and down the shops in the main street, and a drive around the town of Rutherglen, we had lunch at DeBortoli.  Sam and I couldn’t stop talking about how delicious our meal was. The glass wall of Tulleries Restaurant looks onto a formal and elegant courtyard. A center fountain focal surrounded by artistic plot plant displays which added elegance to our dining experience.

During our morning walk, I wandered into a second hand bookshop and picked up some light reading for our stay. Of course I chose something romantic. Being a Jane Austen fan, I couldn't resist a fan fiction novel of Pride and Prejudice from Mr Darcy's point of view. There were two to choose from by different authors. I chose this one because I enjoyed the writing style of the first few pages best. Every day I looked forward to dipping into Amanda Grange's world of 'Mr Darcy's Diary'.  Once or twice I didn't agree with what Amanda thought he say or think that but most of the time I was right there with her. It was fascinating being inside his thoughts about his world and his opinions of Elizabeth and the comical characters like Mr Collins.

In the afternoon, we enjoyed a country drive to Corowa (a nearby town on the Murray River) and walked the shopping district. We noted that a few wineries on way and made plans to return in a day or two. We headed to another pub for dinner and recognized a group of two couples that had been dining where we were the night before. They nodded to us and we smiled at them.
 
We decided to go for a drive farther afield on Wednesday. We lunched at Beechworth, a town renowned for its bakery.  I'm a Coeliac so I couldn’t eat there, but we found a cafe that had a GF frittata on the menu. We enjoyed browsing the many boutiques and gift shops.  For dinner, we had a booking at the renowned Taste Restaurant in Rutherglen.

While savoring our entree at a table close to the front window, who should walk in? The same group of four that we’d dined with the last two nights. We took a look at each other and started to laugh. “Hello again,’ we said. They stopped and talked to us for a while about where each of us was staying and what we’d been doing. It turned out they had also been to Beechworth that day for lunch and that they had lunch reservations at the same winery as us for the following day. 
 
Thursday morning we did some wine tasting at Warrabilla Wines because we’d enjoyed drinking their Shiraz with our meal the night before. 

​We left with a box of Shiraz and then went on to the Terrace Restaurant at All Saints for our lunch. We were enjoying our main meal when our new friends came in and it was like a party. We had so much fun talking all about our holiday week in Rutherglen and discovered that we were all leaving to go home the next day. I also found out that one of the couples owns the Newsagent that I’d been going to for about 20 years!

​We visited the cellar for tasting after lunch and bought another box of wine. Sam is feeling very happy at this point but I'd kept a keen eye on how many drinks I'd had,  so I drove after lunch.

Cellar door at All Saints winery

Sam's citrus desert similar to a lime cheesecake.

The restaurant is in the white annex at the side of the cellar door. The building on the far right is a providore and cafe.

​We left after breakfast on Friday for the drive home, stopping at Glenrowan to visit the Ned Kelly (Famous Aussie Bush-ranger) attractions. 
 
I found a lovely antique shop called Mr Morgan Store with lots of girly things for the Shabby Chic side of me to enjoy. The following video of the delightful shop is an added extra for this blog.

We stopped for lunch with my cousins, who live an hour down the road toward Melbourne. It was a special time catching up with them. Now we're back home. I've been totally pampered and have enjoyed making many happy memories during our Wedding and Honeymoon. I’m still basking in the glow of it all.

In extra news, Sam and I are going for another longer honeymoon to romantic Italy and Cyprus later this year. I'm now in organizing mode for that exciting holiday. Of course there will be blogs to follow about what we are going to do there and travel blogs on our return.

Dora Bramden writes heart-melting, passionate romance