Royal Mail Hotel

Nestled into the base of Mount Sturgeon, at the southern entrance of Grampians National Park roughly three and a half hours from Melbourne, the Royal Mail Hotel combines a bush experience with world-class food and wine. The property is a slow-paced reprieve at the site where the town of Dunkeld was first settled. Accommodations range from minimalist mountain-view rooms bedecked with furniture and light fixtures by Melbourne designer Jardan to the Mt. Sturgeon sheep station, home to a six-bedroom homestead as well as eight dog-friendly sandstone cottages with bathrooms built inside old water tanks. Gardens play a prominent role in the Royal Mail experience; the hotel has the largest kitchen garden in Australia, which supplies the restaurant with nearly all its organic produce, and a 24-acre private garden is home to many rare indigenous and non-indigenous plants. With the Grampian Mountains and their year-round waterfalls right at the hotel’s back door, the Royal Mail is also a prime base for exploring the wilderness and its native wildlife. After a day in the woods, guests can indulge in an eight-course tasting menu with matched wines from one of the top-ranked cellars in the world.

During a road trip along the Great Ocean Road, we stopped near the Grampians in a small town of Dunkeld. We enjoyed lunch at the historic Royal Mail Hotel--blink and you'll miss it (in fact, we did on the first pass).

After receiving a tour of the kitchen's garden, the daily bounty ended up on our plate--an array of heirloom carrots, radishes, asparagus, beets, cauliflower, spring onions, and pinches of mixed herbs.

I've never seen such an abundance of vibrant produce in the middle of November--my mind was still thinking about cranberry and sweet potatoes back at home, but this dish let me dream about a Spring that lasts forever.