The 2024 season threw up a little bit of everything! It began with a lovely dry and relatively calm November leading to good flowering and fruitset for the vines. The dry start was quickly replaced by one of the wettest December and January periods we have seen with 282mm of rain falling over these two months. With the soils brimming with water, the vines green and with plenty of vegetative growth, we slipped into the driest February and March we have experienced, with a mere 10mm of rain falling. The large canopies coupled with the hot and somewhat late summer powered the beautiful bunches through to ripeness with harvest coming early and finishing fast—completed in a two and a half week period across the whole vineyard.

Perfumed aromatics of rosehip, peonies, cranberry and warm baking spices waft from the glass. The palate is salacious and juicy and full of red fruits with layers of strawberry, red currants and blood orange framed by silky fine tannin and a touch of spicy oak. Whilst this wine is made for immediate enjoyment it will cellar well for 3 to 5 years.

The 2024 Yarra Valley Pinot Noir is made entirely from Medhurst Estate fruit from 24 year old vines. All the fruit was handpicked and destemmed into small open fermenters for cold soak maceration. During fermentation, the must was pumped over twice per day with some light plunging towards the end of ferment to ensure optimum extraction. The wine spent 10 days on skins and was pressed to tank and then racked to French oak barriques, hogsheds and puncheons (20% new) where it spent 6 months in barrel, and sent to bottle in September 2024.

Perfectly paired with light meats, peking duck or some pecorino cheese.