Upper Reach: A Swan Valley Wine Journey
At Upper Reach we believe that wine is one of life’s essentials- along with family, friends and good food.
Our story is the creation of something from nothing, of crafting the whole;
from growing the grapes to making our wines, tasting them with you and hearing what you love.
We grow and care for the grapes as they ripen; agonising over such things as irrigation and which day to hand pick our fruit.
Our aim for our wine is to highlight the character of our Swan Valley estate grown fruit, creating wines that are fresh, vibrant and full flavoured. Each wine reflects the vintage and our vineyard.
Its exciting to see how the wines age and develop, whether in barrel or in bottle; we now have our own bottling line (it was the last piece in the jigsaw) and we age everything on-site.
Then finally at the Cellar Door we get to show you the fruits of our labour, taste these wines with you and help you choose which wines are right for you.
The Upper Reach story begins with Derek....
Derek grew up on his family’s wheat farm at Wubin, but it was while working in a wine shop in London, he discovered his true passion… wine. It was also while he was there that he met Laura, who was from London and hadn't really seen a tractor!
In 1996 Laura & Derek headed back to Western Australia, some months later Derek's mother stumbled upon a newspaper advert for a run down vineyard, and so began Upper Reach.
I'll never forget waking up that first morning and thinking 'what have we done....10,000 vines to prune, and we don't know what to do?'
The first huge challenge was growing grapes, up till then our participation in the wine industry....was drinking! At the end of the first growing season we started to learning how to make wine, something that we’re constantly improving on, 25 years on.
You learn pretty quick when its your own time and your own money. You don't make the same mistake twice...
Over the years we’ve built and re-built the cellar door, the restaurant and refurbished the cottage.
Each part of the process is carefully though about and pondered on, nothing is left to chance, we try our very hardest to craft beautiful wines that you’ll savour and enjoy.
Book a winery tour with us - we would love to show you around our winery and vineyard.