Trinity Hill

Lunch at Te Awa winery situated on the Gimblett Gravels. The gravels is considered as the most important terroir in NZ for red wine. They were laid down by a river which changed its course after a flood 150 years ago. The land was poor for any form of agriculture and in 1981 the first vines were planted on a small but rewarding scale. In 1988 one hundred and fifty hectares of this prime land was bought by a concrete business. A coalition of vignerons immediately started a campaign and fortunately the Council was persuaded that a more productive use of the land would be to establish world class vineyards. Now the entire eight hundred hectares of the gravels is planted in vines of the principal French varieties but including Spanish and Italian ones as well.
The Te Awa winery is one of about a dozen situated within the terroir. We had a simply delicious lunch al fresco and then went and visited one of Hawke’s Bay’s most prestigious wineries, Trinity Hill, which is just down the road. Here you see Rossen holding a tasting glass standing with his wife Tina and friend Bozhidar, a Bulgarian who emigrated to NZ forty years ago. Twenty minutes later we’d made our purchases and were happily carrying some boxes of good red wine to the car. No Pinot noir though – this variety is better suited to the marginally cooler regions further south in Martinborough, Marlborough and Central Otago.
Kate