It seems fairly intuitive to us, but great wines start in the vineyard.  There’s an old saying “You can make bad wine from good grapes, but you can’t make good wine from bad grapes.  We believe a great wine is made from great grapes; hand grown and tended every step of the way.  At Robert Young Vineyards we have nearly 320 acres of hand cared for vines.  They are grown sustainably with the end product kept in sight every step of the way.  This is true specially for the grapes that become the wines we make at Kelley & Young.  We know right from the beginning what we want the wines to taste like and so the grapes are grown to assure we can achieve the delicious end product. 

 

    We invite you to come and see the vineyards and follow the wine from beginning to end.  We do not yet have a tasting room on sight, but we welcome you to make an appointment to visit the vineyards and you can buy the wines to enjoy while you’re on your trip or we can ship them for you to enjoy when you arrive back home.

 

Here are some pictures I took of our 2010 Sauvignon Blanc waking up after a long winter’s nap . . . .

Look closely and you can see the leaf tips unwrapping from the fuzzy nod.  They look like little fingers sticking out all around the edges.  Notice how furry and colorful the bud is.  Every part of the mature grape vine including what will later be the grapes themselves are inside.  Absolutely amazing

March 19, 2010

March 19, 2010 magnified

March 21, 2010

March 21, 2010 (twin bud)

I love these shots because they were taken in the morning and you can see the drops of moisture stuck on the hairs of the leaves.  Notice how in just 2 days the buds have opened up and matured.

March 23, 2010

March 23, 2010 (twin bud)

Not much has changed in 2 days, but you can see that the buds are growing and the leaves are relaxing away from he bud center.

March 25, 2010

March 25, 2010 (twin bud)

Again, not much has changed in 2 days, but you now can start to see what will become one of the grape clusters.  Look at the next picture and see for yourself!  This is actually a flower cluster which will mature, flower, pollinate (itself) and become the grapes we’ll use in our Sauvignon Blanc this year. Very cool.