Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Sojourn’s dark ruby-hued 2012 Pinot Noir Rodger’s Creek Vineyard comes from a site located in the icy cold Petaluma Gap region. Completely made from clone 777, and fermented with 100% stems, it exhibits notes reminiscent of cherry pie, plums, cranberries and a hint of wild strawberries. It cuts a broad swath across the palate, but it does not reveal a lot of weight, tannin or forcefulness. This beautifully rich, pure Pinot Noir offers abundant notes of cloves, apple skins and cherries. Displaying a striking similarity to a top premier cru from Burgundy, it can be drunk now and over the next decade.
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Tasting Panel
Silky and smooth with bright cherries and cranberries and savory notes of spice and earth; elegant, pure and classic.
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.