Two Paddocks The Fusilier Pinot Noir 2021

Our thoughts - There are wines that announce themselves politely, and then there is the 2021 Two Paddocks The Fusilier Pinot Noir. It arrives like a story you suddenly remember in perfect detail. From the very first inhale it transports you. Bannockburn's light, cold earth and sun-warmed stones, then a chorus of red berries and a soft lift of rose petal and spice envelop you. For a moment the room falls away, voices dim, and the world goes blank. Why? Because the wine is doing exactly what the best Pinot Noirs do.... insisting you pay attention.

In their words -  “We grow our premium Two Paddocks Pinot Noir entirely on our four small vineyards in Central Otago. In some exceptional vintages, listening carefully, we realise that one of these sites may have something extraordinary to say in its own right. It is only then that we will make one of these very rare single vineyard wines.” - Sam Neill, Proprietor

Brooding, thoughtful, dark and intriguing aromatically, whilst bold the underlying core is elegant, fragrant and fresh. A gorgeous expression of this idyllic Bannockburn vineyard.

The Fusilier Vineyard is named in honor of Sam’s father, Major Dermot Neill, a soldier in the Royal Irish Fusilier Regiment for twenty years before returning home to Dunedin, New Zealand, where he ran the family Wine & Spirit business, Neill & Co. Planted entirely in 2000, The Fusilier is 5.6 hectares of pinot noir, on rolling northerly facing terraces at the western end of Felton Rd and bordered by the vineyard of the same name. Soils on the terraces consist of deep alluvial fans, which are made up of varying depths of silt, sand and gravel layering all derived from mountainous raw schist parent material.