This is the fourth Long Gully Single Vineyard Pinot Noir. Long Gully has always displayed classic red to black forest berry characters and for this cooler vintage blackcurrent and boysenberry really shine through. These same berries dominate the entry onto the palate, and flow in a rich and sensuous vein of fruit through the mid-palate. The wine finishes strongly with masculine fine grained tannin flowing into red berry fruit.

CELLARING POTENTIAL:

Mt Difficulty Long Gully Pinot Noir will improve for 10 -15 years given optimal cellaring conditions.

Vintage: 

2009 was a vintage with excellent flavour definition – intense cool varietal flavours with excellent concentration and typically high acidity providing lovely focus on the finish.

A cooler vintage; the volume of the harvest was down 15% on average. Climatically there was a good start to the season, but December was slightly wetter than usual which reduced bunch numbers. A typically turbulent January was followed by a cooler, wet February which slowed down vine growth. Good canopy management was essential, with canopies left as open as possible to minimise the effects of the weather. Central Otago provided its usual long, fine, warm autumn but a week into vintage a cold spell brought on a cold response in the vines. This hurried the ripening process considerably; shortening and intensifying the season.

Vineyard:

The grapes for the wines that carry the Mt Difficulty label are subject to two strict criteria: they are managed under the umbrella of the Mt Difficulty viticultural team and must be sourced from vineyards situated in a very specific area - the South side of the Kawarau River at Bannockburn. Mt Difficulty Single Vineyard wines are even more site specific, created to express the terroir from which they come, and thus Mt Difficulty Long Gully Pinot Noir is the essence of the vineyard itself. Long Gully has Lochar soils with thin and wavy clay pans which are deep enough to cause no impediment to roots or drainage. These are well-drained, high pH soils ideally suited to viticulture. They generally have a 30 cm depth of top soil over fine to moderately coarse gravels. Long Gully has five different clones of Pinot Noir planted - 5, 6, 10/5, 113 and 115.