Klipspringer

Please note: Award stickers are applied at the producer's discretion and may not be present on all bottles.

All fruit is crushed directly into small pneumatic press & allowed a few hours skin contact prior to gentle pressing, thereafter the juice was settled overnight prior to racking with a fair share of fine lees. Each climat is fermented separately & only neutral yeasts are used–40% of juice from each climat was taken old 400L French oak for ferment, the remainder cold fermented in tank with. Post ferment, only 25% of the barrel fermented portions were taken to 228L old French oak puncheons – the remainder combined with the Inox portions & matured for 9 months on fine lees prior to final blending with the barrel components.

Due to the climatic calamity, only two climats produced fruit for this vintage. ’83 vines rooted in the decomposed schists with ironstone, flecks of quarts of the leeward side of Kasteelberg combine with gnarled ’72 Malmesbury vines rooted in the poor red ferricrete rich decomposed granites. Each site is hand harvested at dawn from the last week of January until second week of February. A tumultuous yet extremely concentrated vintage due to the preceding lean years characterised by small bunches, concentrated flavours at low sugar & as per usual picking on acid rather than sugar. Continual tasting in the vineyards & relying on the farmers knowledge of their vines were cardinal to success in this vintage. The preceding vintages prepared us for the wild ride which was 20-Hateen (tongue in cheek!).

The final blend was kept in Inox for 4 months on its fine lees prior to bottling unfined & unfiltered, under screw cap to preserve the essence of the site, vintage & vines.