Nose
White florals, grapefruit, cantaloupe, spring time dew and gun smoke.
Palate
Lemon curd, wild lemon grass flowers, marri honey and subtle grassy notes are accompanied by a distinct rain
water minerality. The immense texture of this wine adds an extra, unparelled dimension cavorting with the
intrinsic natural acid backbone to reveal a wine with both power, finesse and precision.
Growing Conditions
Chris went through the vineyard and selected five specific rows of the one clone for this wine. The soil consists of fertile
loam over clay with large amounts of granite rock on the surface and throughout the subsoils. The high mineral content of
the soil in this block is expressed time and time again in the resulting wine. The vines were planted on a southern slope
with an East West orientation, allowing for greater shading of the fruit and retention of mineral characters and natural
acid. Cane pruning each year ensures consistent small crops coming out at 4.2 tonne per hectare in 2017. The fruit was
handpicked at first light and chilled prior to processing.
Winemaking
Chris’s unique processing of this wine was compared to the great Didier Dagueneau of the Loire Valley by James Halliday
in a review two years ago. With the intention of expressing the terroir of the site and evoking as much texture as possible
without interfering with the fruit characters Chris experimented (in 2015 with our first vintage) with natural fermentation
on skins for up to 2 weeks. The juice was then lightly pressed off mid ferment and transferred to 3-year-old French oak
barriques for completion of ferment and maturation for 11 months, before an additional bottle aging of 12 months prior
to release.
Appearance
Brilliant pale lemongrass.
