Bay of Fires Pinot Noir 2022

Here at Bay of Fires Winery our philosophy on Pinot Noir production is to preserve to bottle the essential characteristics of the vineyard fruit and create the highest quality blend from subregional Tasmania. Gentle handling of the fruit and wine help to achieve this, while restrained winemaking assists in developing the complexity of the final blend. Several of the vineyards we source Pinot Noir from were planted for us at carefully selected sites. These are now developing in maturity, which translates to better balance and depth of flavour in our wines. The 2022 Bay of Fires Pinot Noir exemplifies this development showing richness and elegance that is so desirable from cool climate Tasmania. 

Appearance: Bright, vibrant red

Bouquet: The perfume of this wine is very complex. Aromatic redcurrant and berry fruit features with Chinese spice from MV6 cloned vineyards and whole bunch influence - star anise, cinnamon plum blossom.

Palate: Although elegant and supple, the wine shows remarkable power, intensity and length on the palate. Framed by ripe, moderate tannin the graceful sweet strawberry fruit is complemented but not dominated by spice. Overall the wine has wonderful poise and balance with remarkable length of flavour as all great Pinot Noirs should.

Vintage Conditions: 2022 in Tasmania was again one of many challenges, with each of the sub regions behaving even more differently from each other than usual. The Tamar Valley was well ahead of all other regions from the outset and performed strongly, with little disease pressure at all and warm sunny days bringing in clean fruit with solid flavour early in the season.  Quality was a pleasant surprise in most cases and is a testament to our committed growers’ efforts during difficult picking. The Derwent and Coal River Valleys both experienced relatively cool and slow ripening seasons, producing excellent quality fruit that arrived very late in the season, picked at relatively high Baumes to manage the acid retention. The outcome of this tricky season is aromatic wines with complex flavour concentration, ripe structure and lovely mid palate weight. Whilst table Chardonnay yields are very low, the quality is excellent. Pinot also had another great year and although we dearly miss the East Coast fruit, the remaining regions all performed strongly. Another promising year from a great variety of challenges.