The area
The estate is situated in Rio Negro Valley, which is 620 miles South of Buenos Aires, 280 miles east of the Andes, 310 miles west of the Atlantic and a further 1240 miles from Tierra del Fuego. In other words, it is located in the middle of the desert. The valley’s microclimate is under the influence of two rivers deriving from the Andes, the Neuquen and the Limay which form into the Rio Negro, which throws itself into the Atlantic. The Rio Negro valley is an ex glacier which is 310 miles long and 15,5 miles large at 250 yards above sea level. In 1828, the British colonies, having observed the large amounts of water flowing down the river, decided to create channels which would irrigate the valley thus forming a type of oasis in the middle of the desert.
The climate
The climate is dry. Maximum 30% humidity and 7 inches of rain/year make the area free of diseases. There is no pollution, meaning that there is a high purity of sunlight (great photosynthesis). There is vast thermal amplitude: in maturation season the temperatures are on average 28 grades centigrade at day and 9 grades centigrade at night. The four seasons are very precise; mild spring, hot summer, mild autumn and a clod winter.
The vineyard
The grapes come from our own vineyard planted in 2004 in Valle Azul in the deserd, which is cultivated Bio-Dynamically and drip irrigated.Other grapes are sourced from the INTA (Agricultural Research Centre) and a producer that we lease from.The grapes are 90% Malbec and 9% Merlot and a 1% of Petit –Verdot.The picking of the grapes starts from early February until end of March.
The wine
A Lisa is a blend of 90% Malbec and 9% Merlot and 1% Petit-Verdot with:
- 14% Alcohol
- pH 3,80
- 5,43 g/l of Titratable acidity
Only 40,000 bottles and 10 Magnums were produced.
NB. As the wine is a 100% natural and unfiltered, it may present some harmless deposits in the bottle.
The winemaking
The winter 2008/09 arrived quite early, it appeared end of May. It was then a very cold, very dry winter with not one drop of rain and quite long.
The Spring was warm, with some strong winds.There were hardly any frosts.
The summer started as early as in end of October, we skipped half of the Spring. Still no rain. The heat and relentless sun kicked in.
We had to irrigate quite a few times this year as there was still no signs of rain. It was the hottest and driest spell we had seen in Rio-Negro in its recorded history, endless days ranging between 35 and 40 degrees Celsius (95 to 104 F). The nights also remained warm, which is very unusual for our area which normally gets very cold at night.In other words, an extremely unsual year.
The grapes formed hard skins and were small berries, but with the warm nights, the polyphenols didn’t ripen as much as we could wish for. Also the sugars went quite high for our area. In other words a year of great luminosity and ripeness.
We began harvest early in the Valle Azul, the 19th of February 2009 with the Merlot then we went onto the Petit-Verdot and finished with the Malbec on the 25th of February. The grapes are from our single vineyard in the deserd.
We then picked later in the Valley from our sources around the 2nd until the 15 th of March 2009.
The grapes were picked in the morning and brought to the winery in a cool truck in order to
preserve the “soul” of the grapes. Something we learned from the valley where they grow some of the best pears in the world, the only way to keep them so good: The cold. All the grapes were
destemmed by hand at the winery into small 2,500 litre cement vats and 10,000 litres stainless steel tanks. The grapes were then cold soaked for 4 days before the indigenous fermentation started, we ferment all our wines on their own yeasts. The alcoholic fermentation lasted 2 weeks, using the “pigeage” or “plunging” and “pumping over” methods to extract the color and tannins. This year we noticed very big polyphenols, thick skins, quite “meaty” grapes and soft tannins.
After the fermentation, the wine was transfered into 100% second use french oak barrels, of the finest quality one can get, for a period of , this year, 8,5 months. The Malo Lactic also occurred naturally in the same barrels for about 1,5 months. No batonnage.
The wine was racked and blended the 27th,28th,29th of December 2009.
The wine was then bottled unfiltered the 5th till the 16th of January 2010.
