Winemaker Notes
Steep, raw and powerful, this hillside monopole sits mere miles from the Pacific Ocean, facing Bodega Bay in between the villages of Freestone and Occidental, where morning fog from the coast engulfs the vineyard. This 1.8 acre site is the oldest meter-by-meter planting of Pinot Noir on the Sonoma Coast, and due to its high density and steepness, is farmed 100% by hand. This site in wine represents RAEN's coolest, most exotic terroir. Rose petals, wild strawberries, black cherries, and forest floor after the rain fills the bowl. This is followed with notes of muddled blackberry, thyme, pine branches and forni brown mushrooms transporting us to the Redwood forest surrounding RAEN's site. On the palate, there is a beautiful ballet between red berries and dark fruit that is seamlessly intertwined with exotic spice box, zesty orange pith, dark berries, and crushed gravel, giving way to a seemingly everlasting finish.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Purple fruit with lavender and seaweed. Hints of volcanic salt and peaches. Full-bodied yet tensioned and very focused. Muscular and very, very long. Flexing with form and beauty. Uniquely Occidental. Mind-blowing sophistication with its own personality. Drink after 2028.
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Decanter
Bodega is a hillside monopole vineyard just a few kilometres from the cool ocean, facing Bodega Bay between Freestone and Occidental villages. Morning fog from the coast engulfs the vineyard; a tiny parcel of less than 2 acres is dedicated to this bottling. Bodega is the oldest metre by-metre planting on the Sonoma Coast. It has pungent floral aromas, turned earth notes, ripe blue bramble fruits, white pepper spice, and clove. The palate balances elegance with a feral streak. Forest flavours of damp pine needles and streaks of crushed graphite envelope a ripe core of blue huckleberries and red raspberries. Delicious, with ample structure and brilliant lift.
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Vinous
The 2022 Pinot Noir Bodega is the most exotic and dense of the three Raen Pinots. Black fruit, mocha, gravel, licorice and spice are all amplified in a Pinot that possesses tremendous density and pure power. There's a bit of reduction here, so I would give this a few years in bottle. This is quite muscular.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Grapes for the 2022 Pinot Noir Freestone Occidental Bodega Vineyard were harvested on September 7. It’s bursting with a mélange of wild strawberry, raspberry and blueberry, plus accents of black tea leaves, mushrooms, woodsmoke and cola. The medium-bodied palate is generous and silky with bitters-laced flavors and a long, seamless finish.
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Wine Spectator
This shows the forward ripeness of the vintage, offering mulberry and boysenberry compote notes dotted with savory and chaparral accents through the finish. Drink now through 2030.
As winemakers and farmers, Carlo and Dante attribute a great deal of what they have learned to their grandfather Robert and father Tim, both whom influenced them from a young age.
Carlo and Dante’s father Tim was a pioneer for California Pinot Noir in the early 1970s and has always had a tremendous regard for the great wines of Burgundy. To this day his Pinot Noirs from the 1970s are showing incredibly well. Carlo and Dante credit their father’s passion for Pinot Noir as the early inspiration that got them excited at a young age.
Dante studied abroad in Switzerland at the Webster University in Genève as well at UC Davis in California. Carlo studied in France at the University of Aix-en-Provence and in Italy at the University of Milan. After their formal studies were complete Carlo and Dante continued their educational work with the winemaking team lead by their father Tim Mondavi at Robert Mondavi Winery and Opus One.
When Robert Mondavi Winery was sold in 2004, the brothers joined their father Tim, Aunt-Marcia and grandfather Robert as they founded Continuum in 2005.
In 2013 Carlo and Dante founded RAEN winery with the goal to produce world class Pinot Noir on the western hills of the Sonoma Coast. RAEN currently focuses on making three Pinot Noirs, from three unique sites on the Sonoma Coast.
The Sonoma Coast AVA is large in area but, not counting overlapping regions like Russian River Valley, only has a few thousand acres of grapevines—and it’s no wonder. Much of the region is rugged and not easily accessible. Its proximity to the Pacific Ocean’s fog and cool breezes limits the varieties that can be cultivated, but it proves to be an ideal environment for high quality Pinot Noir.
Since fog is a frequent fact of life here, as are heavy marine layers that sometimes bring rain, the best vineyards are wisely planted above the fog line, on picturesque ridges that capture enough sun to provide even ripening. That, with the overnight drop in temperature that reliably preserves acidity, results in fine expressions of Pinot Noir that often receive tremendous critic and consumer praise alike, and are often in high demand.