65% - Full Moon Vineyard – Gladysdale – Upper Yarra

We work with Simon Harte at the Full Moon Vineyard in the Upper Yarra Valley.

18 year old vines are grown on chocolate coloured volcanic soils on a gentle west facing slope in Gladysdale. This immaculate vineyard is tendered to like a garden.

It’s a marginal subregion for grape growing but with careful vineyard management these vines have produced pristine and powerful fruit.

35% - Willowlake Vineyard – Gladysdale – Upper Yarra

This is our 7th year working with Tim Wray at the outstanding Willowlake Vineyard in the Upper Yarra Valley. Located on a south facing slope in Gladysdale on red and grey volcanic soils capping a tabled ridge of basalt.

Vintage

A wet and cold spring of 2019 led to a long and slow flowering period. The resulting poor fruit set meant our crop was well below average.

A complete turnaround occurred in December with a warm and windy month drying out soils and forests.

Bushfires ran all over the country from late December and the risk of smoke taint was ominous. We were very lucky that the smoke billowing into the Yarra was from far away bushfires, meaning the tainting chemicals were weak and could not permeate into the grapes. All tests we conducted and observed were clear.

Bizarrely, after all this mayhem, we had one of the coolest and wettest January to March periods on record. This is the crux of the vintage.

Very slow ripening followed with high botrytis risk, but the grapes retained subtle, fresh flavours and remarkable acids. 

Winemaking Stats

Picking Date – 18th to 20th  March 2020      

Variety - 100% Pinot Noir     Clone – 777 and MV6

Hand harvested early in the morning.

All of the Willowlake Vineyard and approx 50% of the Full Moon Vineyard was wholebunch fermented for a maximum of 12 days on skins with just a few foot stomps. This equates to approx 70 % of the blend.

The remainder of the Full Moon vineyard was destemmed and gently pumped over for a 18 day fermentation.

All natural alcoholic and malolactic ferments.

The vineyards were blended post pressing to mature in tank and a mixture of old and 1 year old barrels/puncheons to retain their freshness.

Minimal sulphur just prior to going to bottle in spring with no fining or filtration.

Bottling Date – 15th Sept 2020

pH - 3.65         TA – 5.60 g/L  Alc – 12.5%     RS < 2 g/L