Vavasour Papa Chardonnay 2019

Our Papa Chardonnay has a bouquet of stone fruit with peach, nectarine and hints of citrus. The palate is weighty and textural, with flavours of stonefruit and citrus, along with saline minerality and natural acidity to give length and drive.

Cellars 1-15 years. 

WINEMAKING

Good things grow in unyielding places. Places like the Awatere Valley. For all its raw beauty, it is home to unforgiving soils, cool winds and some of the driest conditions in the country. But we have been here from the start. We know intimately how these very elements conspire to produce remarkable wines, like our Papa Chardonnay.

Named for the compacted blue-grey mudstone that holds tight to the roots of our mature vines, Papa Chardonnay has a generous, textured palate of rich stonefruit and elegant citrus. With hints of flint and a saline minerality, it could only be from this most singular place.

The Awatere Valley is a dramatic southern pocket of Marlborough, pushed up out of the ocean by seismic activity, and carved out by ancient glaciers. Stonier, drier, cooler and windier than Marlborough’s main Wairau

Valley, the Awatere Valley’s terroir conspires to produce distinctive, complex, intriguing wines.

These old rows are planted east to west which gives us staggered ripening and a variety of character from within the vineyard. After hand harvesting our grapes, we used native and natural yeast from the vineyard. Fermentation took place over 10 months in seasoned French Oak Barriques and 18% new oak.