Half Bottle: Chateauneuf du Pape Vieux Telegraphe 2016

The Rhone Valley in both North and South was blessed with near perfect weather conditions. Average summer temperatures were a little higher than 2003, but the evening and night temperatures were much cooler. This naturally helped acidity and tension in the wine. Rain in August really benefited phenolic ripeness. The resulting grapes were harvested in near perfect health conditions.

This is undoubtedly a great vintage and Daniel and Frederic Brunier are delighted with the Vieux Télégraphe 2016 and their superb Gigondas Domaine les Pallières. Importantly Vieux Télégraphe does not produce a super cuvée. The younger vines are now used in the new impressive Télégramme and just one wine is made exclusively from old vines all around the ‘Crau’, the finest terroir in Châteauneuf du Pape.

Domaine les Pallières, situated at relative altitude in Gigondas, is quite superb.

Along with Château de Beaucastel, Vieux Télégraphe, is recognised as the very best estate in Châteauneuf. It is owned by the Brunier family, who also own Domaine de la Roquette, our other mainline Châteauneuf along with Domaine les Pallières, our favourite Gigondas. If Beaucastel represents power and weight then Vieux Télégraphe stands for elegance and restraint yet with a depth of complex flavours which appreciate time to blossom.

Vieux Télégraphe was founded in 1898 at Bédarrides by Hippolyte Brunier. It was in 1792 that Claude Chappe, the inventor of the optical telegraph, built one of his signal stations on the Plâteau de la Crau where the vineyards are located. Hippolyte therefore called his estate Vieux Télégraphe.