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Region: California - Sonoma Coast
Grapes: Pinot Noir
Alcohol: 12%
Notes on the Wine
The East Ridge is a topographically distinct micro-site within the Hirsch Vineyard, sloping steeply into our eastern canyon and thereby relatively protected from the Pacific Ocean. Two thirds of the vines on the East Ridge have phylloxera, a disease that attacks the roots and inhibits the vine’s uptake of nutrients. This results in some of the lowest yields at Hirsch, and requires extremely intensive and careful farming. The East Ridge Pinot Noir is a masculine and powerful expression of the Hirsch Vineyard, with fantastic structure, concentration and fruit.
Notes on the Producer
Perched on a ridge overlooking the Pacific at Fort Ross, Sonoma County, Hirsch Vineyards is the birth ground of great pinot noir on the Sonoma coast. David Hirsch founded the vineyard on the extreme Sonoma Coast to grow fruit and make site-specific wine. The pinot noir and chardonnay wines from Hirsch Winery give the passionate drinker an experience of the clash of opposites meeting in Nature and Life: the edge of the continent washed by the sea; the eviternal grinding of the North American and Pacific plates along the San Andreas Fault; the wet winters and dry summers caused by the ocean and desert climates;the dripping rainforest and parched pastures; the contact and intermingling of cultures: Native American, Mexican, Russian, European; the change in rural economy from logging and ranching to winegrowing. In the grapes and wines of Hirsch Vineyards and Winery you find a natural balance and consistency in the harmonious resolution of these opposites.
This climatic chaos is coupled with a geology containing a highly varied mélange of sandstone-based soils and assorted rock placed at random across the rolling hills and ridges on which the vineyards are planted: an erratic climate working on highly variegated soils and exposures and slopes. The San Andreas Fault comes from vines at an elevation of 1,300—reaching a height with plenty of sun above the fog line.
The 2010 San Andreas Fault is the signature pinot noir and the most complete representative of the complex Hirsch Vineyard. 2010 was a cold vintage on the coast, and the resulting wines are characterized by elegance, restraint and a profoundly old-world fruit character. 2010 marks the 30th year of farming on the extreme Sonoma Coast.