Kate Honnef oral history interview, 25 November 2016

Kate Honnef

Thomas and Kate Honnef with the help of co-owners Cal and Rose Irons established Ocean View Estates in 1988 when the first grape vines were planted.

Our partners in this business had friends that owned this block of land - an elderly couple, and the husband passed away. They were really close to this couple, and they wanted to help her out, so they bought the land off her.

The block of land was situated in the rolling hills of Ocean View on the Mt Mee Tourist Drive. Not wanting to sub-divide, it was decided it would be perfect for a winery. Thomas was raised in a wine making region of Germany, and returned to this after working as a bio-chemist.

They started by planting a couple of acres of grapes and fell in love with the idea and the concept. Within two years they were growing grapes on eight acres and built a shed to make the wine - their first vintage was in 2002.

The grapes take three years to reach full maturity, or full production at around five years. The quality then just gets better over time. Picking the grapes is done by hand and locals are employed to help.

They are all processed on site,

there is a lot of science, a bit of art and a bit of passion…. Thomas who is the wine maker, is very pedantic about keeping everything clean and with fresh flavours coming through.

Today there is a first-class restaurant, wine cellar as well as three cottages and a house. The business caters for weddings, guests, daily winery and brewery tours and picnics.

Thomas and Kate are locals, as well as the staff, the community works together to help and promote each other. Each year the business does a lot of community based activities to give back to the area.

For example, ‘Community Cook-up Day’

We’ve got the commercial kitchen and we’re closed on Monday and Tuesday so we’ve got about maybe 20 people coming together to cook hampers for both the Mt Mee, Ocean View, Dayboro community. There is a bunch of ladies coming from Samford as well for the Samford community. We’re putting together basically a beautiful Christmas dinner for 60 different families and distributing them.