A land of extremes, New Zealand, or that’s how they’re selling it today. Viticulturally they’re dead right, and there’s no better example of viticulture at the extreme than Central Otago, or just ‘Central’ in kiwispeak. If you’re not already on bottle-opening terms with Central Otago’s pinot noir, pinot gris and riesling, look out. You’re likely to enjoy the ride. At a latitude of 45 degrees south, Central is the world’s southernmost wine region. It’s also one of the most spectacular, with colossal mountain-ringed landscapes of open plains, large lakes and wild rivers. Some of its peaks top 2000 metres, while even the vineyards themselves are planted between 200 and 450 metres above sea level. Central Otago’s climate is perfect for quality wine, from certain varieties. Unlike the rest of New Zealand’s, its climate is a continental one, with hot, dry summers and cold winters. There’s a substantial diurnal range of temperatures in the growing season, believed to aid colour and flavour development. The region’s extreme latitude also contributes to its exceptionally long sunshine hours throughout the growing and ripening seasons. Falling in a large rainshadow cast by the Southern Alps, the area’s relatively low rainfall of around 325-700 mm increases towards the west and falls consistently throughout the year, peaking in springtime. Autumn is relatively dry. Irrigation is essential over most of the region, but water is anything but scarce to come by. Washed by water, blown by wind or even sluiced by the goldminers of 140 years ago, Central Otago’s soils are typically free draining and textured, also high in mineral content but low in organic matter. They’re a positive aid to managing vine vigour through pruning and irrigation. Aside from what many believe to be the inevitable arrival of phylloxera, the region’s main viticultural problem is Spring frost, most likely if a large dump of snow on nearby mountains causes a downhill movement of very cold air. While the first grapes were planted in the region back in 1864, it wasn’t until the early 1981 that Rolfe and Lois Mills planted the bulk of the Rippon vineyard on the banks of Lake Wanaka, close to the northern extreme of the region. The vineyard now comprises thirty acres, forty percent of which is pinot noir. As such, Rippon is today one of the least committed of the region’s pinot noir growers!1 An almost incredible 70% of the region’s expanding 1000 acres of vineyards is pinot noir, while pinot gris and riesling amount to around 10% each. The first Central Otago pinot noir to be commercially released was the 1987 vintage from Gibbston Valley. Take a car from Queenstown past Lake Hayes, which is only marginally suitable for viticulture, and you drive through the heart of the Gibbston sub-region. Most of its vineyards are planted on very limited sites atop north-facing alluvial fans and perched river terraces above the spectacular Kawarau Gorge, home of the Bungy Jump as well as names like Chard Farm, Gibbston Valley and Peregrine. Then head roughly eastwards over the mountain passes of the Pisa range and you emerge near the villages of Bannockburn and Cromwell, the viticultural hub of Central Otago. At Bannockburn are wineries of the profile of Felton Road, Mt Difficulty and Olssens. Based at Cromwell and also sourcing fruit from Lowburn on the western bacnks of Lake Dunstan, Quartz Reef will ultimately source the majority of its fruit from a new vineyard near Bendigo on the eastern banks of Lake Dunstan, 12 kilometres north of Cromwell. Bendigo has become another major viticultural centre, although its development to this time is vineyards only. Most local wineries like Peregrine and Gibbston Valley have either planted land there or else have contracted to purchase Bendigo fruit. There’s also plenty of available viticultural land at Bendigo, already something of a rarity in Central Otago. Keep going northwards, swing west and then you arrive at Lake Wanaka, on whose picturesque banks lies Rippon, whose spellbinding vineyard site has probably covered more magazines than Elle McPherson. Meantime, had you turned south instead of north at Cromwell, you would cross the Cairnmuir Mountains into another valley populated by the winegrowers of Clyde and Alexandria, listing amongst their number Black Ridge, Leaning Rock and Dry Gully. While vineyard sites are limited in some sub-regions, there’s still plenty of room for considerable expansion around Lowburn, Bendigo and even to a lesser extent in Bannockburn. It’s early days yet to pin precise regional characters on Central Otago’s pinot noir, but few regions have produced pinot with such depth and accentuation of pure pinot noir fruit from young vines. Few of the wines lack richness and substance, and the best offer the true silkiness and fineness of structure of great pinots. Looking at what some makers are putting in the bottle, and having seen the extent to which the newer producers are fastidiously experimenting with sites, clones, aspects and management techniques, Central Otago should ultimately produce more pinot noir of the highest quality than any region outside Burgundy. A variety of rootstocks are deployed and many vines are planted on their own roots, so by the time phylloxera ultimately arrives, most will need to be replanted. Instead of viewing this inevitability as a negative thing, winemakers like Felton Road’s Blair Walter have taken the approach that during the pre-phylloxera interim they should experiment with every conceivable combination of clone, rootstock and vineyard site. So, once the replanting has occurred, the vineyards should each be working at full potential. Recent experience in the Napa Valley and Oregon fully substantiates this theory. While it’s early to define sub-regional characters, pinot from the Bannockburn sub-region tends to present dark red and black cherry fruit and firm, bony tannin, while those from Gibbston are finer and spicier, offering maraschino cherry fruit. The Cromwell/Lowburn wines are savoury, smooth and very spicy, while those from Wanaka are more fine and delicate, with lightly herby red berry fruit. Winemaking isn’t supposed to be a competitive sport, but Central Otago has turned up the heat on regions like Martinborough, the Mornington Peninsula, Yarra Valley and Tasmania, each of which have marketed themselves in recent years as the New World’ equivalent to Burgundy. Truth is, they have already been gazumped. Presented below are some of the currently available (but still limited) wines that have done the gazumping.
