Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
From a hillside vineyard situated in the cool Petaluma Gap planted with DIjon clones 115, 828 and 667, the stunning 2013 Pinot Noir Gap’s Crown Vineyard reveals notes of forest floor, baking spices, blue and red fruits, a beautiful, medium to full-bodied mouthfeel, velvety tannins and a stunningly complex texture as well as length. It stood out as one of the finest Pinot Noirs I tasted on this trip. The natural alcohol came in at 14.6%, and the color is a healthy dark ruby.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
A vast appellation covering Sonoma County’s Pacific coastline, the Sonoma Coast AVA runs all the way from the Mendocino County border, south to the San Pablo Bay. The region can actually be divided into two sections—the actual coastal vineyards, marked by marine soils, cool temperatures and saline ocean breezes—and the warmer, drier vineyards further inland, which are still heavily influenced by the Pacific but not quite with same intensity.
Contained within the appellation are the much smaller Fort Ross-Seaview and Petaluma Gap AVAs.
The Sonoma Coast is highly regarded for elegant Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and, increasingly, cool-climate Syrah. The wines have high acidity, moderate alcohol, firm tannin, and balanced ripeness.