Lime Rock Estate Central Hawke’s Bay Pinot Noir 2016

Lime Rock Vineyard is an unique boutique wine producer in Central Hawke’s Bay, west side of the town Waipawa. The vineyard had been planted on the slopes of an old limestone quarry. The underlying limestone base is derived from an old sea bed. The crumbly limestone structure, called Coquina made up of crushed barnacle shells, embedded with large scallop and oyster shells that form the base of the logo.  The entire property occupies 20 hectares of lands, of which 9 hectares are planted.

The vineyard is currently managed by the proprietor couple, Rodger Tynan who runs viticulture, and Rose Butler does the winemaking.

The vineyard has between 230m and 270m altitude results in cooler sites and steep slopes that allow cool air to drain and prevent frosts. The area in general is much cooler than the rest of Hawke’s Bay, suitable to produce Pinot varieties, Sauvignon Blanc, and other Germanic varieties.

All vines are trained on VSP trellis system, with about 2500 vines per hectare. We aim to have yields of less than 2kg per vine. Shoot thinning and leaf plucking are done by hand and any green bunches removed before veraison. The reserve Pinot Noir comes mainly from a very steep slope planted with clones 777, 667 and Abel.

The vintage of 2016 had been a moderate year. It had some rains and cooling during early March, which allows the fruit to have moderate flavour and decent acidity. Winemaker Rose decides to cold soak the skin for 3 to 5 days to fully extact the aroma, but prevent excessive tannin extraction. Then there is 8 months of barrel ageing. The barrel came from famous French coopers, like Mercurey, Dargaud & Jaegle and François Frères. After malo-lactic fermentation and ageing the wines took place in these 225 litres barrels The best of the barrels are blended to get this wine.