Wines Under the Vines!

Words by Mark Tarr

The Terrace Edge Wines Under the Vines tasting tours were an outstanding sensation again this year.

Picture this - a beautifully warm and calm, blue sky Easter day. You are well dressed and excited to be out on a unique tasting adventure with your friends. Greeted with the dramatic view of the Waipara River Valley you know you’ve got your priorities right today.

Welcomes and formalities over, and you are into it. The dramatic landscape, the steepest little Syrah slope you would ever want to see, takes your breath away. The vineyard is veiled, tucked, gift-wrapped in bird netting. Neat little packages of vine rows, elegant bunches poised, harvest is imminent. You discover something - an exceptional comparison of grapes and wine. A very tangible, kinaesthetic moment. You are in between grape rows looking, smelling, touching the grapes. Tasting the grapes, ripe and ready, discussing the viticultural practices from the soil up - the vines' annual cycle, what it takes to grow wine. Culminating with tasting the resulting wine from this process, these vines.

In this environment you not only taste the terroir in the wine, you experience it all around you. The land, the climate, the people.

You have been taking notes on your journey. They read;

Riesling:

High acid variety, lemon lime, honeyed character when riper, tight bunches prone to botrytis

Terrace Edge Classic Riesling - pure, clean in style, lemon and lime, off dry r/s 12.5 g/L

Terrace Edge Liquid Geography Riesling - picked later/riper, small portion noble rot, honey comb, ripe stone fruit, medium, r/s 35 g/l

Pinot Gris

Grapes have spicy skins, fleshy - most grapes red/brown colour, some naturally green, some bunches half and half

Rich Alsatian Style, 60% barrel fermentation, lees stirring giving texture with creamy, bready characters

Pinot Noir

6 different clones add different characteristics. Earliest variety to ripen, skins give colour and tannins.

Dark fruit characters, savoury complexity, earthy, some floral notes, elegance.

Syrah

White pepper on the skins of the grapes, very large bunches, later ripening in Waipara’s cooler climate.

As you close your note book and laugh with your friends, recapping the day’s highlights, you realise that today you have been exactly where you wanted to be.

So if that sounds like the kind of outing you would enjoy, look out for it Autumn 2017.

Follow the Facebook page, or sign up to the news letter to stay informed.