HAWKESBURY HILLBILLIES

Building a new cider shed; fires, floods, opening the new cider shed and Covid – was the 4 month summary for Hillbilly Cider co-owners Shane and Tessa McLaughlin by March 2020.

“It was only when the lockdown happened in March – that we got the time to actually sit back and process what we’d been through in a short time span” laughs Tessa, “until then we’d been going on adrenalin and a never ending to do list” she adds.

Skip back to December 2019 when the small township of Bilpin in the Blue Mountains was hit by The Gospers mountain fires for 2 weeks. The McLaughlin’s had spent the last 12 months building their new cider shed ready to move from their current shed next door for a pre- opening.

On the 15 December the fire hit their home property