Monthly Vineyard Walks for local vineyard personnel – growers, viticulturists, owners, and interested parties are being resurrected.  The walks themselves will commence in September and in the meantime the first of an introductory educational meeting took place this week. Winemakers from the various sub-regions of Central Otago spoke about their perceptions of the 2009/2010 growing season and how viticultural activities have followed through into the wine. Winemakers generally felt that 2010 will produce exceptional wine for Central Otago, due in large part to a prolonged “indian summer” after an earlier stop/start season, in conjunction with vigilant vineyard practices.

One of the benefits of our Singapore participation in the Robert Parker event is that Lisa Perotti-Brown MW, wine writer for Parker’s Wine Advocate, will visit Bald Hills next week as part of a tasting tour of New Zealand wines.It is a great honour to be able to give a private comprehensive tasting of our wines to this remarkable “palate”. Lisa is to publish her impressions of New Zealand wines in the October Wine Advocate.

Our Tasting Room reopens on August 1 and remains open daily from 11a.m. until 5p.m. We enjoy our visitors very much and showing our wines is a great source of pride for us. Blair is usually in attendance to answer your questions, and if he doesn’t know he defers to “The Queen”. Beagle X Blue Heeler, “Bella the Beautiful” will show her pleasure in seeing you again.

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Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

Blair recently showed our wines to the Halswell Wine Club and the Johnsonville Cellar Club when he visited Christchurch and Wellington  Both nights were cold and miserable but members came out in their numbers and gave Blair and our wines a warm welcome. A primary focus for the next twelve months is to visit as many of the clubs as possible.  Let us know if we can visit yours.

Our visit to Singapore has been very successful. Excellent reviews appeared in both The Wandering Palate (Curtis Marsh)  http://www.thewanderingpalate.com and The Local Nose (Sarah Mayo) http://www.thelocalnose.com . We have also published the articles on our website.  Curtis is a New Zealander who lives in Singapore and publishes in journals throughout Asia, and online. He is a determined espouser of NZ wines. Sarah is one of Singapore’s best-known “noses” and an influential lady in wine circles.  After participating in the Robert Parker event at the magnificent Fullerton Hotel, Bald Hills hosted a wine dinner at well-regarded restaurant “The Wine Garage”.

Masterclass. The Central Otago industry association conducted a masterclass for members last week. Fifteen Central Otago Pinots from Vintages 2006, 2007 and 2008 were shown and the characteristics of each sub-region discussed.  The objective was to learn the best method of conducting a masterclass but a side benefit lay in discovering the differences and similarities between the wines, which were shown “unmasked”, that is, not “blind”. Marvellous! I was reminded of how much fun it is to hold a wine tasting evening at home with a group of  wine-loving friends. You would find the Decanter website an excellent aid to hosting such an evening. http://www.decanter.com

The vineyard has been having a quiet rest after giving its’ all to the 2010 harvest, but not for long. Pruning has commenced, repairs to posts and wires are underway, gravel is being laid and improvements to the headlands and grass swards are underway.

Our road has been sealed! No more dust, no more bone-shaking rattling of visitors’ cars!

Cheers,
Estelle and Blair.

Just 100 wineries from around the world have been invited to show their wines at the Hermitage Wines “Ultimate Parker in Asia “ event to be held in Singapore in May.

Robert Parker Jnr is one of the world’s most influential wine reviewers.  He is to be accompanied by Lisa Perrotti-Brown, Master of Wine and newly appointed Robert Parker reviewer for New Zealand and Australia.

The event is to be held in the Grand Ballroom of the luxurious Fullerton Hotel where two days of Tastings and Master Classes will be followed by a Charity Gala Dinner for 400 invited VIP guests.

Robert Parker rarely accepts invitations for public or trade appearances and this is his first such visit to South-East Asia.

Bald Hills is one of Central Otago’s up-and-coming boutique wineries with an annual production of just 2500 cases.

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For further information, including a range of high resolution photos, please contact:

Blair Hunt – Bald Hills Vineyard

Tel: +64 3 445 3161 Cellphone +64 (0) 27 229 0032 or blair@baldhills.co.nz

Talking of birds, we have had to be particularly vigilant this season. The waxeyes actually force their way in through the netting and they help each other too! Net mending has been pretty constant for myself (Estelle) assisted by a friend, Jane, and Blair has had to start his day with a reconnoitre of the entire vineyard checking for gaps. Bella the Beautiful from Melbourne (vineyard dog) has played her part too, catching a rabbit most days and sometimes a bird or two for an entreé.

OK. I cannot fight it any more. I thought it would go away but it hasn’t. I am talking about social media. I have been in denial. This week I will start tweeting, set up a Facebook page, connect with Link’d In and start a blog! It all seems very daunting to me, being of the older generation and somewhat technologically challenged but sometimes you do what you have to do. I will start slowly with a tweet or two and gradually progress to the others when I get my confidence up.

Our website is being updated and converted to a modern SME platform. Initially, websites existed to inform but today they need to be interactive as well and they need to be easier to manage from the owners point of view and much easier to navigate. It should be ready by the end of May so do have a look, and if you feel there are improvements to be made we would appreciate your feedback.

Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

Friends Misha and Andy came over for dinner the other night and we had Pinot Gris with a delicious buttery chicken liver paté- the pale straw coloured Gris with just a hint of sweetness and gentle acidity was a lovely match. We followed with crispy skin salmon and a well dressed salad which we matched with a lighter Pinot Noir. Pinot is great with salmon, especially a perky, crisp sort of Pinot with strong flavours but not too much depth and complexity. For dessert it was poached Black Doris- plums with a yogurt icecream. We thought a sweeter Riesling was great with it, but by then we couldn’t really tell.

Sustainability is a primary focus in the wine industry today. NZ Winegrowers’ stated aim is to have “all NZ grapes and wine produced under independently audited sustainability schemes by vintage 2012″. The focus is to farm the land without degrading it and to attend to the proper disposal of waste and use of water in the winery, amongst other things. At the Pinot Noir 2010 Conference held in Wellington in February, Andrew Jefford (wine author and columnist) spoke of the three pillars of sustainability, being environmental, economic and social. Food for thought.

The nets which protect the grapes from bird damage went on this week. At Bald Hills we use those massive block-out nets. They are a lot of work. Hard to put on and frequently in need of mending, but worthwhile nevertheless because they enable work to continue beneath them without the need to untie and retie. Waxeyes are a real problem. They enter through the smallest hole and suck the juice from the grapes. Clouds of starlings cruise above looking for big openings and if they get in they can decimate the crop in a short while.

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Our road has still not been sealed but we are assured it is happening “soon”. Happy days!

Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

Our “Single Vineyard” Pinot Noir 2008 is not yet ready for release. We opened a bottle the other night to check on progress – and found it needs more bottle development before releasing. The 2009 Pinots are now in French Oak absorbing some of the luscious oaky flavours and developing their own inherent grapey layers.

We also opened a bottle of the 2002, our first vintage under the Bald Hills label and it was delicious with a great casserole of shoulder of pork with roasted fennel and coriander seeds from Ray McVinnie in one of the recent Sunday Star Times weekend magazines. The pork fell apart, rich and unctuous, and this particular Pinot, earthy, leathery, savoury almost “feral”, which we thought would be a perfect match with wild duck, turned out to be the perfect complement. We sat in front of the fire. It’s a tough life.

While in tasting and comparing mode we opened the “Last Light” Riesling 2007 and found it to have developed that petrolly character favoured by many lovers of Riesling. It is dryer than any other Riesling we have produced, and shows an edgy steely acidity which matches well with overly rich fresh white cheeses and creamy sauces. We think it will benefit from further cellaring. You may do so for $ 240.00 per case, delivered. Telephone or email us if you would like a case. It is not on the website. We have just 36 cases left.

Tony Lingard is now three quarters through the pruning – fastidious, wonderfully experienced Tony. He worked most recently at Grant Taylor’s Valli Vineyard and prior to that on the Lane’s vineyard in the Gibbston Valley. Bald Hills, Bannockburn is closer to home for him.

The Tasting Room will be open by appointment in July and August, then full time again from September. Click here to go to our website.

If you are thinking to send a gift of wine to the UK or Europe please be aware that The New Zealand House of Wine stocks our product over there and you may find it convenient to order from them. click here
Naturally if you prefer to deal direct with us that option is always available to you! Here is another link to our webpage click here

Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

The vineyard is in shutdown mode.

Winterizing has been completed and pruning has commenced. Bald Hills uses a mixture of cane and spur pruning, depending on the grape variety and clone and its position and exposure to the elements. Our much needed extra pair of hands, Tony Lingard, has started pruning and pulling out, using electric shears, and he will most probably move through the entire vineyard by himself and at his own pace. Another one of Grant Rolston’s crew will commence the tying down of the canes very soon and Blair will mulch the prunings with tractor and mulcher. A nice change from office work.

In the office we are now enjoying the accounting and systems expertise of Rachel MacDougall. She achieves in one hour what it would take we two computer-challenged seniors several days. Her focus has been on streamlining our accounting systems so that Blair and I can spend more time on the essentials, such as marketing!

Bald Hills has appointed United Cellars to help with marketing. Following meeting personally with them we are confident that they are a thoroughly professional and dependable team of experts who know their wines. While currently based in Australia they intend also establishing in New Zealand some time soon. They may approach you by telephone and if so you will know they have our full endorsement.

We decided to release our 2007 “Single Vineyard” Pinot Noir following the announcement of a Gold Medal win at the recent 2009 Decanter World Wine Awards in London , the only Gold for Pinot Noir awarded to a Central Otago wine. (click here to go to our website) We also won Bronzes at the International Wine Challenge. It is especially rewarding to achieve these results in a rapidly increasing field where the competition is very tough and the judging stringent. Our focus has always been on quality not quantity and the awards we have won over the years for all our varieties bear out that we are succeeding in this endeavour.

The Tasting Room remains open through June and July. We will close for the month of August and take a break in Australia but will open by appointment upon our return. From September it will be business as usual – open every day from 11-5.

Look forward to you visiting when next you’re in Central.

Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

In the latest international competition, the 2009 Decanter World Wine Awards, at which more than 10,000 wines were judged by a team of experts, Bald Hills was awarded a Gold Medal for its 2007 “Single Vineyard” Pinot Noir.

In the same competition Decanter awarded a Bronze Medal to the earlier vintage, the 2006 “Single Vineyard” Pinot Noir. Previously Bald Hills scooped the pool with its 2005 Pinot Noir when it won Decanter’s International Pinot Noir Trophy in 2007.

“This year we entered just the two wines and were rewarded with two very highly regarded medals. You can’t ask for much more!” declared the Hunts.

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For further information, including a range of high resolution photos, please contact:

Blair Hunt – Bald Hills Vineyard
Tel: +64 3 445 3161 Cellphone +64 (0) 27 229 0032 or blair@baldhills.co.nz

Bannockburn, New Zealand, 13 May 2009

We were honoured when more than 100 delegates to the NZ Gardens Trust conference visited Bald Hills to view the garden and enjoy morning tea. A shower of rain the night before gave the garden that wonderfully polished and sparkling look under the blue skies and sunshine Central Otago regularly turns on for important occasions!

New Releases

For the first time we have made an early drinking style of Pinot Noir and have released it to the market within a month of bottling. Named “Three Acres”2008, it retails for just $30. (To purchase, click here.) In fact this wine received the same barrel aging and french oak treatment as our premium “Single Vineyard” Pinot but displays gentler tannins which need no further aging. Following the enthusiastic advice of one of our customers, we call it our “mid-week pinot”. The more luxurious “Single Vineyard” 2006, now two years in the bottle, can be saved for the weekend!

Enthusiastic collectors with cellars may buy both 2007 and 2008 “Single Vineyard” Pinots direct from us only as they have not been released to the general market yet. The price is unchanged – $44 per bottle, as is the 2006.

Bald Hills now offers a user-friendly secure site for you to order your wine online using your credit card. It removes any hassle and you can do it in a blink! See our website, www.baldhills.co.nz

We are pleased with our new brood of chooks, even though they turned out to be more rooster than hen. Pretty Boy and Gail have each had one wing clipped following a nasty episode in the garden just before the visit of the Trust. They have a magnificent new henhouse, the Chook Hilton, but they favour an old dog kennel to roost upon.

Look forward to you visiting when next you’re in Central. Be sure to check out the garden too.

Cheers,

Estelle and Blair.

BANNOCKBURN, New Zealand, 11 November 2008

Following the enormous successes of its 2005 Pinot Noir at the international wine competitions in London in 2007, Central Otago’s Bald Hills has done it again at the Sydney International Wine Competition [SIWC] 2009.  The vineyard has won Blue-Gold for its “Single Vineyard Pinot Noir 2006” and Top 100 Blue-Gold for its “Single Vineyard Pinot Noir 2007.”

In the SIWC, award winning wines are tasted with food. The competition is capped at 2,000 entries, hence a Top 100 wine is in the top 5% of the entered wines.

Owners, Blair and Estelle Hunt, formerly of Sydney, are ecstatic. “Winning these prestigious awards for what is now three consecutive vintages cements our position as a reliable producer of premium quality Pinot Noir”, said Blair. “Interestingly, the first significant award that the 2005 Pinot Noir gained was indeed a Blue-Gold from the SIWC 2007,” he continued.

Bald Hills, established in 1997,   comprises some 7 hectares of vines, 5 of which are in Central Otago’s prized pinot noir and the remainder in pinot gris and riesling.

The wines are available in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra at some top-end restaurants and fine wine outlets and through Bald Hills’ distributor KiWiNZ. The New Zealand distributor is Lace Fine Wine Merchants, in the UK, Ellis of Richmond and in Singapore at Le Vigne.

The Hunts are currently seeking distributorship in Brisbane and Perth.  “The timing of these awards could not be better,” said Blair. “With exports rising to proudly place Pinot Noir as New Zealand’s second most exported variety, a Central Otago Pinot Noir of proven quality is a ‘must have’ on any premium restaurant wine list.”

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For further information, including photos please contact Blair Hunt, Tel. +64 3 4453161, cellphone  +64 (0)27 229 0032 or blair@baldhills.co.nz