Described by the legend Larry McKenna as the vintage he had waited 30 years for and was “as good as it gets.” I am very interested to see how this wine from the Insight Series (which also includes the single vineyard ‘Pahi’ and ‘Kiwa’ wines) is looking 13 years on. Te Rehua comes from the ‘Barton’ vineyard which has a variety of clones and an average vine age of 22 years – at the time of vintage. The ferment included 50% whole bunch with the wine spending 18 days on skins prior to being aged 18 months in 40% new French oak barrels (the previous vintages only 12 months).
Under cork in excellent condition. My first observation is that it is surprisingly dark in colour with no signs of ageing, and is medium ruby with some transparency. Aromatically still very much primary aromas of black cherry with some perfume character in the background. Structurally, despite its age, it is still very dense with firm, grippy tannins and intense, ripe black cherry flavours. The presence of oak is still apparent. Based on how this is showing it certainly will be a long lasting wine and I will be not opening my next bottle for at least 5-8 years, and would expect this to be very long lived. 93pts
