Cool, Calm And Collected—The Pact’s Holy Grail
IN NAPA VALLEY, we famously have only good vintages and great vintages. But the 2023 vintage has different reference points altogether. In fact, you have to go back a couple of decades—to the early aughts, say—to find a growing season it resembles, in the best possible way. The vintage has a throwback to cooler times, when we spent more energy monitoring Mother Nature in the vineyard than managing her—cooperating with and capitalizing on mild conditions rather than mitigating the warmth that has been more common in recent years.
In short, it was a model vintage. A long, cool spring delayed budbreak and flowering, predicting a late harvest in the fall. The moderate temperatures persisted through summer and well past recent harvest dates. Plentiful natural resources—including ground moisture from winter rains—allowed canopies and fruit to thrive under the growing conditions we always hope for: low, slow and cool.
While the entire valley was cool, Coombsville, in the southern most part where our Faust Vineyard is located, is often 10 degrees cooler than regions up-valley. Elevated on a bench in the vineyard, the vines that produce The Pact have sightlines to the fog billowing off San Pablo Bay that is in large part responsible for the lowest temperatures in the valley.
In warmer years, when sugar levels rise somewhat earlier and acidity levels begin dropping, our picking decisions are more urgent—they must be made in a narrower window. In 2023 that wasn’t the case. We had the luxury of waiting—of sitting on our hands, in fact—while sugar levels topped their natural bump, physiological elements reached natural maturity, and Mother Nature decided the season was over. In truth, it’s harder to decide when to pick when you don’t have to than when you do. But in the end, the phenomenal hangtime produced complex flavor development with perfect balance. An ideal closure to an ideal growing season.