ON THE ROAD | Christina Kaigg-Hoxley in the Adelaide Hills

Christina Kaigg-Hoxley, Wine Development Manager at 67 Pall Mall Melbourne, recently spent a few days in the Adelaide Hills, visiting local producers and focusing on the region’s Chardonnay wines. She shares her key takeaways from the trip…

Our first step comes via a driving tour with Turon White, winemaker at Turon Wines, where we pass slope after slope of trellised vineyards in varying shades of yellow to brown. Almost every one borders a fruit orchard or vegetable plantings, with the many small valleys co-planted with brassicas, strawberries or pomme fruit. Turon welcomes us to his small, family winery, where his two young daughters and wife Alex pass cold beers around the smouldering fire pit. It turns out the cold we are feeling is relatively mild for the region, but White enjoys harnessing it in Chardonnay’s piercing natural acidity and propensity for bright, citrus overtones. Despite his label’s success, however, the economics of producing wine in Adelaide Hills mean that he still makes wine under contract for other labels, a model that is not unusual due to the high cost of water licences, labour and the exceptionally high land value in the area. 

Early pioneers in the region, like Weaver, whose vineyards are based in Lenswood, were originally concerned about ripening fruit in this cool region, and hence chased warmer sites. Shaw + Smith was similar, starting with plots in the lower parts of Woodside but quickly turning to cooler sites at higher elevations in Piccadilly and Lenswood for quality Chardonnay production. Even though only Piccadilly Valley and Lenswood are recognised officially as sub-regions, areas like Lobethal, Mount Barker, Balhannah and Macclesfield all regularly appear on labels, to communicate the diversity of elevation and aspects across the region. 

Murdoch Hill’s top Chardonnay cuvée ‘Rocket’ is perhaps the most driven and tightly wound of the wines we taste, but with a moreish palate and reductive overtones that speak of the potential for ageing. Both Michael Downer and Gentle Folk’s Gareth Belton, part of a younger generation of winemakers, spoke in depth on the push for producers to pursue purity of fruit and emphasise differences in site, soil type and clone.

A recurring topic on our trip was water security, an obvious point of concern for growers due to the extensive dry period the region is experiencing – the driest since records began in the 1830s. At EKIN, we listened as viticulturalist Mark Vella, standing in a soil pit dug between vine rows, explained the intricacies of root penetration and why site selection is key for water retention. Irrigation is essential for most producers, with access to a water licence the difference between growing vines or not. As a consequence, establishing new vineyards can be intensely challenging and costly, and with more and more producers dropping yields in pursuit of quality, the cost of fruit has never been higher.