Margaret River finding its feet Cape Lodge on the Margaret River. Picture: Daniel Scott. Paddling the Margaret River. IT'S early December in Margaret River, WA's prime wine-producing region, just days after bushfires destroyed several houses, including the area's most historic home. The central township is bustling, my accommodation at Cape Lodge, set beside lakes and vineyards behind the coast, looks magnificent and the tours I am booked to take are unaffected. Well, not quite unaffected. On my first morning I join Sean Blocksidge's Margaret River Discovery Tour and he begins with an apology. "I'm afraid I lost my canoes in the fires," he says, as our small group paddles at the mouth of the Margaret River, "so I've borrowed these." We're around the corner from Prevelly, one of the villages worst affected by the fires. A week before, Blocksidge, working alongside other volunteers from the local bushfire brigade, battled to save this section of coast from the blaze. His dramatic photographs made newspaper front pages and were published around the world. Beside the river is now a bleakly beautiful scene. In the distance, I can see the charred ruins of Wallcliffe House, the heritage-listed home built by the region's earliest settlers, the Bussells. Nearby, blackened tree stumps stand out against coastal dunes, once covered in vegetation but now burnt back to sand. Small green shoots are already appearing. In April is the 21st annual Margaret River Festival (April 13-16). The program includes a Vintage Festival, with 300 wines to sample, free street fiestas in the Margaret River and Dunsborough town centres and a Twenty20 cricket match featuring WA's top players, past and present. The festival starts with the Long Table Feast at Leeuwin Estate, which is orchestrated by five of the region's chefs, including Cape Lodge's Tony Howell. During my visit, I have an exquisite dinner prepared by Howell, including tender seared scallops with Asian omelet, sushi rice and ginger jelly and sweet-fleshed local marron. The Vintage Festival is on Saturday at Palmer wines, at Dunsborough in Margaret River's north, showcasing new-release and vintage wines and providing an opportunity to meet Australian winemakers. There will be live music and a Live Art Arena, where visitors can see art being created by a dozen local artists. "Welcome to Australia's most consistent wine-growing region," says Blocksidge, as we continue our tour driving along the main coastal artery, Caves Rd. While Margaret River only accounts for 3 per cent of the country's grape production, it makes nearly 30 per cent of its premium wine. With a Mediterranean maritime climate, low summer rainfall and low-nutrient soils, Margaret River has all the ingredients for making top-quality wines. Remarkably, though, it wasn't until the mid 1960s that its potential was recognised and surgeon Tom Cullity planted its first vineyard. The region now has more than 5000ha under vine and 150 wine producers. Instead of rushing between wineries, Blocksidge's tour visits just one, the small Fraser Gallop Estate, which has won international awards for its cabernet sauvignon. Lunching here, we taste the "summer-in-a-glass" semillon-sauvignon and the latest cab sav and discuss their creation with Australian winemaker of the year, Clive Otto. We end the tour strolling along the Wilyabrup cliffs on the coast. It's scenery like this that makes Margaret River the complete package. Offshore, the Indian Ocean, whipped up by the Roaring Forties winds, forms some of the planet's biggest waves. Rolling and smashing against this granite coastline, the sea has sculpted a succession of bluffs, bays and rock formations. The writer was a guest of Tourism Australia.