Vineyard: 20km north of Heathcote lies a 10-acre vineyard situated on the red Cambrian clay loam of the Mount Camel Range. The vineyard is dry-grown with traditionally low rainfall, leading to highly concentrated wines with good acidity. Sitting above the frost line, the grapes are harvested later than most in the region, and produce wines with grace and elegance and without the Heathcote ‘heat.’ The Shiraz vines were planted in 1997. Winemaking: The fruit was handpicked on the 12th of March, manually sorted, destemmed, and then gently crushed into open-top fermenters. Fermentation took a total of 12 days, with each ferment being hand plunged three times daily, ensuring full yet gentle extraction of phenolics from the skins. The wine was then basket pressed direct into 3-year-old French and American Oak barrels, where it laid on it’s lees for 14 months before its initial racking, and spent a further 10 months in barrel before bottling. The wine was bottled unfiltered with minimal sulphites.
