Patz & Hall Gap's Crown Vineyard Pinot Noir 2017
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Jeb
Dunnuck -
Robert
Parker
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Winemaker Notes
This vineyard sits high on a rock strewn, windswept hill directly overlooking the Petaluma Gap, the coastal mountain feature that feeds the cool Pacific air into the Russian River basin. Usually the last vineyard we pick each year, and often the most tannic of our wines, the 2017 offering has a softer, less tannic and more resolved composition. Intense aromas of black cherry, citrus peel, dark cocoa along with hints of mushroom-forest floor intermingle and intertwine. Gap’s Crown Vineyard is a very long-lived wine that rewards patient cellaring for many years to come.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Classy forest floor, mulberry, black raspberry, spice, and incense notes emerge from the 2017 Pinot Noir Gap's Crown, a beautifully elegant, seamless, classic Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir. This is a great vineyard.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2017 Pinot Noir Gap's Crown Vineyard was made with 10% whole cluster and aged in 50% new oak. It's medium ruby-purple and reluctantly opens to black cherries, pipe tobacco, jamón ibérico, forest floor and accents of dried lilac. It’s medium-bodied and silky with expansive layers structured by mouthwatering acidity and a grainy frame, finishing long. This is delicious now but will benefit from another year in bottle.
Rating: 93+
Other Vintages
2016-
Jeb
Dunnuck
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James
Suckling -
Jeb
Dunnuck -
Wine &
Spirits -
Robert
Parker -
Wine
Enthusiast
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James
Suckling -
Wine
Enthusiast -
Robert
Parker
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Wilfred
Wong -
Wine
Enthusiast -
Robert
Parker
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Robert
Parker
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
A vast appellation covering Sonoma County’s Pacific coastline, the Sonoma Coast AVA runs all the way from the Mendocino County border, south to the San Pablo Bay. The region can actually be divided into two sections—the actual coastal vineyards, marked by marine soils, cool temperatures and saline ocean breezes—and the warmer, drier vineyards further inland, which are still heavily influenced by the Pacific but not quite with same intensity.
Contained within the appellation are the much smaller Fort Ross-Seaview and Petaluma Gap AVAs.
The Sonoma Coast is highly regarded for elegant Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and, increasingly, cool-climate Syrah. The wines have high acidity, moderate alcohol, firm tannin, and balanced ripeness.