Craggy Range 'Aroha' Pinot Noir 2024

The outstanding 2024 vintage expresses its place with remarkable clarity. It opens with bright lavender perfume, and chocolate-cherry aromatics. Red and blue fruits unfold with measured precision, the stem tannins sweet and ripe, providing a fresh framework that carries the depth of fruit without excess. Poised yet deeply resonant, this wine carries all the hallmarks of a benchmark release with the substance to reward from extended cellaring.

"From the Martinborough region in New Zealand, which makes some of the world’s best Pinot Noir, the fruit here hails from the wonderful Te Muna vineyard, which is now twenty-five years of age. The name, ‘Aroha’ is Maori for love. And it is simply impossible not to love this wine. From the brilliant 2024 vintage, fermentation was with wild yeasts. The team fermented 85% whole clusters in French oak, while the component which was from clone 114 was fermented in a combination of French oak and sandstone amphorae. Maturation was for a further fourteen months. I can’t remember a better example of this wine from any past vintage. A purple/blue hue, the nose offers a wonderful array of aromas, weaving through cherries, truffles, violets, wild raspberries, leaf litter and notes of freshly baked blackberry pie, just emerging from the oven. We are already seeing some early complexity and, no doubt, that will increase enormously over the coming years. The structure is seamless, the balance impeccable, and the concentration beautifully defined. A wine of focus and energy with great length through to satiny tannins on a lingering finish. Stunning stuff and for me the finest Aroha I can recall. A fifteen-year proposition." 97 Points - Ken Gargett, Wine Pilot