Due ​​​​​​​South

If Hawaii and Napa Valley had a love child, it would look like Margaret River— an Australian wine region with epic surfi ng beaches, a welcoming vibe, and standout Cabernets and Chardonnays.

- Ted Loos

Aussies like to say that Perth, the capital of Western Australia and a five-hour flight from Sydney, is the most isolated major city in the world. Which means that the Margaret River wine region, which is set on a tab-shaped peninsula jutting into the Indian Ocean—and a three-hour drive south of Perth— must be as remote as it gets.

A gruelling 24 hours of travel from New York City, Margaret River was the farthest I’d ever been from home. But flying wasn’t the stressful part of this trip. Driving on the left side of the road was what really made me anxious. I stuck a Post-it note on the steering wheel of my rental car: stay left, it read, with an arrow for emphasis. The agent chuckled as I pulled out of the lot.

I made the trek to ‘Margs,’ as locals call the area, primarily for the wine. The case can be made that it’s Australia’s best wine region because of the sophisticated restraint that vintners pour into its top bottles. (Cabernet Sauvignon is the star grape here, followed closely by Chardonnay.) There are nearly 100 wineries open for tastings, many of which are located north of the town of Margaret River along a 10-mile stretch of Caves Road, where dense patches of forest alternate with honey-coloured pastures. Fees are non-existent—the winemakers are just thrilled you made it to see them.

But Margs has a lot to offer beyond the wine. It’s one of the most free-spirited places I’ve ever visited, and the people here have struck an enviable work-life balance. Because much of the coastline falls inside 145-square-mile Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park—a constantly shifting landscape of granite cliffs, scrubby forests, and golden sands—the beaches are pristine. “Surf culture runs deep here,” said Will Berliner, when we met at his winery, Cloudburst. “If there’s a big swell that day, your plumber might be late to fix your sink.”