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When Paul and Kathy Drogemuller bought a burnt-out dairy farm at Paracombe in the Adelaide Hills after the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires, they had no idea how special the property was, or how well-suited it would be for growing grapes.
âWe were both young hillbillies,â says Kathy. âPaul grew up in the Paracombe area, and Iâm from Lobethal, another town in the Hills. We were newly married. When that land came up for auction it needed a lot of work, but we thought it was a good opportunity.â
In the beginning: Kathy Drogemuller at Paracombe in 1983. Â
The Drogemullers werenât wine people at the time. Kathy was a dental nurse, Paul was a former AFL player and builder. But a neighbour at Paracombe, who worked at the old Tolley winery in nearby Hope Valley, told the young couple that the winemaker there, Andrew Garrett, was about to set up his own business and was looking for people to grow grapes for him.