If you are interested in a future release, please do not hesitate to contact us, and we will notify you just before its release. Because of the limited supply of our products, we allocate our supplies of new releases to regular customers first, to people who pre-register their interest in specific wines second, and then on a first-come first-served basis.

2024 

The 4th La Nina summer in a row produced a year warmer than 2023, but still one of the cooler and wetter vintages at Maipenrai.  Budburst was the last week of september after a dryish winter.  But like the 2021/22/23 growing seasons substantive rain events continued through the entirety of spring. Flowering was still a mixed bag due to the weather, and occurred in the second-half of November.  Another the very large canopy remained healthy through out the growing season, as again we had lots of cloud and consistently mild weather. Mid February brought veraison and quite a warm autumn, and we ended up picking the Pinot Noir on the 17th of March. 2.3 tonnes harvested. We fermented in a single vat with 15% whole bunch. The Fermentations went through without issue, and we pressed the wine into barrel after 3 weeks - 1/3rd of which is new French Oak. 6 Barrels made.  

We also made some Amungula Creek Pinot from some fruit from Lerida Estate, and 3 Barrels of Shiraz Viognier from a mixture of fruit from our own vineyard, Murrumbateman, and Lake George. 

2025 

Weatherwise - a more typical year - with rainfal and temperatures more typical than the past 5 years, which were all over the place. Budburst was around October 1st, which is typical, and the vines grew well, but needed some water this year to get them through flowering which finished the last week of November. After 5 years of not setting much fruit, this year the vines made up for it, and put on a huge amount - too much, which we started thinning in December and January. Summer had a fair bit of rain, but not too much, and warm weather without any punishing period - ideal conditions for our Pinot Noir. Veraison commenced the last week of January - which is a bit earlier than our long-term average - but given the amount of fruit to get ripe, not a bad thing! The end of Feb through early March were warmer than average with a bit or rain, but not enough to cause problems. In the end, we decided to pick our very large (6 tonnes) crop on 8th of March. The large crop meant we had to use every vat we had as well as a few more we borrowed, with 20% whole bunches used in our 2-tonne fermenters which were targetted for Maipenrai. Wines were pressed after 3 weeks, and put into a mixture of Barriques of different ages.  The wines are relatively low alcohol (12.5%), have a depth of colour, good acidity and nice primary fruit.  19 Barriques made of which ~10 will become Maipenrai Pinot Noir. 

We also purchased some Pinot Noir fruit from Lerida Estate which will be added to our fruit to make a sizeable amount of Amungula Creek Pinot Noir, and 3 Barrels worth of Shiraz Viognier from a mixture of fruit from our own vineyard, Murrumbateman, and Lake George.