Rock Ferry Trig Hill Pinot Noir 2020

Accolades:
96/100 – Vince Simmon
5 stars – Michael Cooper

“Rock Ferry’s Trig Hill Vineyard highlights the elegance and capability of the southernmost wine region. Central Otago is New Zealands island, continental climate appelation, a near oxymoron for an island nation. Trig Hill is a 19 hectares site that excels producing Pinot Noir on its northern-facing slopes. Rock Ferry uses 15% whole bunch inclusion and over a year of elevage in french oak barrels to capture the balance of tanins that compliment this Pinot Noir’s dense cranberry, tart pomegranate, and red cherry fruit structure. On the Wine’s finish the red fruit turns to black cherries complimented by vanilla and clove from the french oak. Central Otago benefits from antarctic winds that temper the regions hot and sunny days. The cooling winds enable grapes to retain acidity and help give this Trig Hill Pinot Noir a lot of natural structure and fruit development that shines in the glass. While already drinking nicely, this is built for further cellar aging in the bottle.” – Vince Simmon, Wine Review Online

“Already drinking well, the 2020 vintage was estate-grown, 400 metres above sea level, at Bendigo, hand-picked and matured for 16 months in French oak barriques and puncheons (35 per cent new). Highly perfumed, it is rich and silky textured, with concentrated cherry, spice and nut flavours, very complex and savoury. Best drinking 2024+. Certified organic.” – Michael Cooper

Tasting Note: 2020 was a very good year for Central Otago and this allowed us to bottle unfiltered, meaning less interference and giving us great palate weight. The aroma is finely scented and shows an abundance of fruit with notes of wild herbs, dried fruit and sweet spices. The fleshy palate has layers of complexity with finely structured tannins to the finish.

Winemaking Notes: The fruit was hand harvested from the upper slopes of the vineyard. 90% of the fruit was de stemmed into French oak cuves and the rest was added as whole bunch. The cuves were naturally fermented with gentle hand plunging. Post ferment maceration was 21 days. This was then pressed and racked off into a mixture of seasoned and new (30 %, 30% 1 year old & 40% 2 years old) French barriques, where it underwent malolactic fermentation and was left to mature for 16 months. As we age this wine in barrel for 16 months, we use very tight grained French oak which has been air dried for 3 years. It was then racked off lees and bottled. Clones: 75% 115, 20% Abel, 5% 777.

Certification: Organic

Alcohol: 14.0%

Variety: Pinot Noir

Region: Bendigo, Central Otago, New Zealand