Black Hills Estate Winery always rocks with incredible wines. And now Black Hills rocks with two 2024 “Hiatus Collection” wines, sourced from the Rocks District but crafted in the Okanagan Valley — Nota Bene and Ipso Facto. The B.C. winery’s decision to use grapes from Washington-Oregon was not easy. However, two consecutive winters of extreme cold damaged many of their vineyard blocks, so Black Hills made the difficult choice to source “exceptional vineyards in Washington and Oregon” for their 2024 Hiatus Collection. “The name Hiatus captures this chapter: a pause with purpose.” Both these wines have the wow factor. And as someone who was born and raised in British Columbia, and now lives in Washington, I’m all in!
Tag Archives: Rocks District
R|A Family Wines
We attended the launch of R|A Family Wines in Seattle last week, and all we can say is wow. Well no, actually, there’s a lot more to say about this exciting new collaboration in Washington winemaking, with its roots in The Rocks District of Milton-Freewater. R|A stands for Reynvaan and Andrews – representing a friendship spanning generations between the two co-founding families. Matt Reynvan is the acclaimed winemaker of Reynvaan Family Vineyards, while entrepreneur Rob Andrews comes from a family with a long-held connection to the land.
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The Schoolhouse
We know whenever we spend time with L’Ecole 41‘s passionate winemaker Marcus Rafanelli at the schoolhouse, we’re going to have a fun and educational time. And our recent trip to Walla Walla continued that trend. For example, last month Marcus poured us recent releases and library wines in addition to tank and barrel samples. We compared the future releases to the current and older ones, and we can definitely say there is more impressive L’Ecole wine in the years ahead.
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Full Pull Wines
Over the last six months, we purchased several different bottles from Full Pull Wines, the amazing online retailer based in Seattle. Since I can’t drink wine right now while I recuperate from knee surgery, this article features these Full Pull wines that we are looking forward to opening in the future. They are either 1) new vintages of wines we’ve enjoyed in the past; 2) new wines from winemakers we appreciate; or 3) wines we’ve never had before but are attracted to their tasting notes from others.
We initially wrote about Full Pull, the brainchild of owner (and excellent wine writer) Paul Zitarelli, shortly after its October 2009 launch. Paul sells wine through a mailing list. The process is simple. First, Full Pull emails you about wine their staff loves. Next, you request the bottles that appeal to you. Finally, you pick your wine up at the warehouse or have it shipped. Better yet, there is no monthly fee or minimum purchase. And the deals are worthwhile. Read on for details of the latest wines we ordered.