The estate · Broke, Hunter Valley
A working country property, run by a family.
Bought in December 2012, still being restored.
Max and Bernadette both grew up in Broke. They moved away for years — interstate, work, the usual — and in December 2012 they came home and bought a run-down property on Broke Road, with a tired vineyard already in the ground and a lot of fencing to fix. Everything since has been a slow restoration: the paddocks, the cattle, the natives going back into the ground, and eventually three places for guests to stay.
Max runs the herd and the land. Bernadette runs hospitality — she and Max live on the property, in the homestead. Laura looks after the brand and the way the place feels from the first email onwards. Alex looks after the tech and has built a surprising amount of the property with his own hands, including the Bell Tent's amenities pod and the Caravan's deck and kitchen. The four of them run it together.
The vineyard was here before the family was. They ran it for over a decade and made a first vintage of their own in 2016, but the Hunter has enough excellent winemakers, and in 2025 the last vines came out. The cattle stayed.
"We just want people to feel at home here, the way we do."Bernadette Tolson
Seventy-four hectares, a small herd.
We run a small herd of beef cattle — the numbers shift with the seasons, which is how a working farm goes. They're not in the photos for atmosphere; they're why the paddocks look the way they do, and you'll often spot them going about their day.
Where the old vineyard rows came out, natives are going back in — a few hundred went into the ground last spring — and the regrowth is starting to look like it belongs. A brook runs along the property’s border. Hot air balloons drift over in the cooler months, and sometimes land in the paddocks. In the evening the sun sets over the neighbouring dairy farm’s hill to the west, where the cows file in to be milked twice a day.
The rest of the property.
Paddocks, cattle, firepits and the horizon that comes with them. Click any photo to see it larger.
A small cellar, winding down.
We didn't plant the vineyard — it was here when we arrived — but from 2016 we made estate wines we're quietly proud of. The last vines came out in 2025, and there's no next vintage coming. Some stock remains, and it continues to find homes.
If you'd like to take a bottle home, we'd be glad. We aren't a winery, but we made a wine, and we'd rather it ended up on your table than ours.
What we are not.
It's quicker to say up front, so no one drives two hours expecting the wrong thing. We're happy to recommend somewhere that does these well.
We don't host ceremonies or receptions.Staying for a wedding somewhere else in the valley? That we can do.
No conferences, retreats or hire-the-whole-property weekends.Quietly, we like it that way.
The last vines came out in 2025.A little estate wine remains, until it doesn't.
Considered, yes. Polished, no.You'll see the cattle. You'll hear the wind. Both are the point.
Three places to stay, all on the same farm.
Different in almost every way except the paddocks around them and the family running them.
Come and stay.
The Cottage, the Bell Tent and the Caravan. Book direct and you're dealing with the family. That's it.
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