Wayfarer Wayfarer Vineyard Chardonnay 2018
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Winemaker Notes
The 2018 vintage is the first to include their newest Chardonnay blocks – 2 acres grafted from Pinot Noir to Chardonnay in 2016. A bouquet of orange blossom, jasmine, toasted almonds and lemon zest prepares the palate for beautiful acid and wet stone. This fresh structure is enveloped in a rich texture that balances the linear focus of the wine.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2018 Chardonnay Wayfarer Vineyard opens with explosive perfume! Gunflint, spring honey, white flowers and salted almonds mingle over rich quince paste and warm apple fruit. The palate is equally as compelling, its powerful, rich layers of flavor packed into an ultra silky frame, offering bright pops of juiciness and a finish that goes on forever. Wow! It's stunning now but may improve with more time in bottle. Rating: 98+
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Jeb Dunnuck
From the estate vineyard in the Fort Ross-Seaview appellation and barrel fermented (all native yeast) and aged 15 months in 70% new French oak, the 2018 Chardonnay Wayfarer Vineyard offers a classic and slightly Burgundian style in its caramelized orchard fruits, toasted nuts, brioche, and white flower-laced aromas and flavors. Showing a touch marine-like salinity with time in the glass, it’s medium to full-bodied and has good concentration, integrated acidity, and a great finish. Give it a year and it will drink nicely for a decade.
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Wine Spectator
Big and rich, with hints of toasted coconut to the ripe apple, pear and melon flavors that glide across the palate, accented by smoky richness. The unctuous finish lingers, revealing notes of lemon drop and buttered toast. Drink now through 2025.
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In tandem with his daughter Cleo and renowned winemaker Bibiana Gonzales Rave, Pahlmeyer drives to make intricate wines of transcendence, answering to powerful, ever-unpredictable climate that rewards only the most observant and meticulous. It is an endeavor of true passion, an experiment that pushes the exactitude of winegrowing and winemaking to the farthest limits.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
On the far western edge of the larger Sonoma Coast appellation, the Fort Ross-Seaview AVA hugs right up against the Pacific coast. Vineyards, planted at rugged elevations between 920 to 1,800 feet, occupy only two percent of the total land in the AVA. Fort Ross-Seaview growers believe that the region boasts an ideal mix of sunshine, cool air and beneficial stress for producing high quality Chardonnay and Pinot noir.