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Many
of you know the story of this vineyard, but for those who
don’t, I will give you a quick history…These vines are not
just old they are ancient!
The vineyard was planted
in 1896 by the Vanucci family; some of the original settlers
in this area of California. The vineyard survived
Prohibition by being passed off as producing wine for
sacrament – Praise the Lord! We purchased the vineyard in
1996, at its 100th birthday.
The old Zinfandel vines
that once flourished had been abandoned and neglected for
over 10 years and given up for dead, completely overgrown
with wild blackberry vines, oak saplings and scrub brush. My
sole intent was to use this amazing site, which consists of
beautiful fertile hillsides with southeastern exposures, as
a home for Pinot Noir and Syrah. As I began to clear the
brush by hand, preparing the land for planting, I found a
vine here and there that had managed to send one long
straggly arm through the tangled mess, to the top of the
canopy with just enough leaves to make just enough energy to
stay alive!
To give you the
condensed version, we saved just under 3 acres of the
original 10 and began nursing it back to health. 3 years
later we made our first 2 barrels from these reincarnated
old gentlemen! The rest of the vineyard is now producing
great Pinot Noir and Syrah, and this Zinfandel block is up
to a whopping 6 barrels a year (about 150 cases)!
The vines are dry-farmed
which means no water except for the winter rains, which
creates concentrated, extracted flavors of brambly raspberry
and boysenberry and those deep old roots add an amazing
brown spice complexity.
Total Number of
Cases Produced: 150
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