• Medium-dry style
• Passionfruit
• Honeysuckle
• Juicy & salivating

Aromatic on the nose with fresh citrus, jasmine, honey and kumquat. Bright and zesty on the palate, with lime, grapefruit, passionfruit and honeysuckle notes. A juicy and salivating Chenin Blanc with a touch of saline acidity which nicely offsets the residual sugar. Mt Difficulty Chenin Blanc will improve for 1-5 years given optimal cellaring conditions.

The grapes for the wines that carry the Mt Difficulty Bannockburn label are subject to two strict criteria: they are managed by our viticultural team and must be sourced from Bannockburn vineyards - the south side of the Kawarau River in the southern Cromwell basin. Each has a specific terroir, largely influenced by climate, and offers a variety of soil types from open gravels to heavier clays. Mt Difficulty Mt Difficulty Bannockburn Chenin Blanc is sourced from our Long Gully vineyard consisting of Lochar soils with thin and wavy clay pans which are deep enough to cause no impediment to roots or drainage. These are well-drained, high pH soils ideally suited to high quality viticulture. They generally have a 30 cm depth of top soil over fine to moderately coarse gravels. This vineyard is perched atop the banks of the Kawarau River and is one of the oldest sites in Bannockburn.

The 2022 season swung the pendulum again for Central Otago. This season was characterised by a very warm summer, punctuated by vital rain events, culminating in a bumper crop that was harvested 1-2 weeks ahead of long term average. The benign, warm flowering conditions in December resulted in excellent fruit set and healthy canopies that galloped through a dry January. They were replenished by rain in February before harvest began in mid-March and was wrapped up by mid-April.

The fruit was hand-picked from the Long Gully vineyard. The juice was handled in a reductive fashion throughout processing. The wine was racked clean and fermented with indigenous yeast to retain the purity of the Chenin Blanc fruit. The warmer season, with slightly lower acidities, dictated the style in which we made the wine, resulting in a medium dry style. The ferment was stopped by chilling when sugar acid balance was obtained. The wine was filtered but not fined.