2019 Fall Release

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Harvest 2019 – Our 20th Vintage!!

Dear Friends,

My, how time flies! We apologize for the later than normal release letter, but what a busy fall it has been for us. The culmination was bringing in the final grapes of the 2019 vintage on October 18th beginning at 3:00am. Our picking crew lit up the vineyard and got to it, completing the work in about four hours. The grapes were at the winery by dawn and the detailed process of sorting began. By the end of the day the juice was “enjoying” a cold soak before fermentation begins. We had a little fun this harvest with our new young Cabernet Franc vines. We took a light crop and made a Rose, which we will share with you in the spring. All in all, it has been a wonderful growing season without any issues.

We enjoyed doing a Grand Vertical Tasting of our Cabernet Franc and Rendezvous in September. What a treat it was to revisit the wines and see how they have aged. Donny has often said the “sweet spot” for our wines is about six to nine years old. He wasn’t wrong, but it was delightful to sip the original 2001 Cabernet Franc and others from the early years and taste the flavors that are uniquely an expression of Trespass terroir. During the winter months we hope to add some of our notes to the website. We both wear many hats (actually ALL the hats), so sometimes distractions get in the way of the best laid plans!

On to the fall wine release…..we have four wines to offer, wrapping up the spectacular 2016 vintage. The consensus in the Napa Valley is that this vintage is second only to the amazing 2013’s. The depth of flavors and complexity of these wines are destined to make them a classic, and a cellar favorite.

2016 Trespass Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

270 cases produced

From a classic vintage emerges a classic Cabernet. This wine has a thousand nuances weaving through it. Within the beautiful, dark tangle, I easily find aromas of reduced blueberry, dried plum, graphite, whiffs of vanillin and new French oak. As a baby, this wine benefits from a decant as it really opens with a little extra air and moments resting in the glass. Purity of fruit is the best way to describe this wine. It rides the rails of absolute brightness. The flavors of blackberry, raspberry and red cola delight the pallet. There is roundness to this wine, which gives it a width and approachability that is quite warm and welcoming. A standout, right where it should be in the Trespass lineup. This wine will drink quite well to 2035 and beyond. Aged for 22 months in 70% new French oak, bottled unfined and unfiltered.

2016 Trespass RENDEZVOUS

150 cases produced

This beautiful blend has returned for its 11th vintage, and like an old friend, every encounter picks up where the last left off. Consistency is the keyword to this wine and what a fantastic, showy vintage for this standout red! Beautiful spicy red fruit pushes immediately up the nose with blackberry, ripe black cherries, hint of barrel toast and grilled bread, vanilla wax and that aromatic energy that only Cabernet Franc lends to the wines blended to it. Pushy with black berry, dried currants, plum fresh acidity and flavorful, chewy tannins. The co-fermented blend has plenty of muscle and we can’t wait to see how it develops after 5, 10 and 15 years of cellaring! Aged for 22 months in 100% new French oak, bottled unfined and unfiltered.

2016 Trespass Old Vine Zinfandel

125 cases produced

As winemaker Kirk Venge says, old vine Zinfandel has a very welcome place in his heart. “These vines are soldiers that have endured so many seasons, it’s nearly countless. We depend on these vineyards for their pure varietal character, depth and consistency. The Luvisi Vineyard, where the grapes for this wine originate, is perhaps the oldest vineyard I have the pleasure of working with.” This is nothing short of a rich wine with lovely red fruit layers from start of the nose to the black fruit flavors as the finish tapers off. The flavors are rich and ripe with a brambly strawberry preserves that carries throughout. Balance is found with bright, prominent acidity and tannin texture. It’s beautiful to see old vine Zin respected and made in this fashion. Our barrel regime is a bit different as we age in 50% new French oak with the balance in neutral barrels, rather than the conventional American oak. The subtle nuance it gives to this fruit is truly delicious! Aged for 17 months and bottled unfined, unfiltered.

2016 Trespass Petite Verlot

50 cases produced

What on earth is Petite Verlot? A sensational Bordeaux mélange is what! While blending Merlot and Petit Verdot has been in practice in Bordeaux throughout its history, in the Napa Valley it is far less common. Donny knocked it out of the park suggesting combining these two reds at one of our typical blending sessions one afternoon. These two varitals are quite different in shape and size but alas, they complement each other especially well. The dark and inky color shines through from the Petit Verdot. The massive nose is a fine bouquet of the two, violets from the Verdot and sweet red fruit from Merlot. The flavors take off with warm, ripe and smooth black fruit flooding the bottom of the palate. The flavors are long and stretch to a point where the underlying power of Petit Verdot out pace Merlot and give the wine backbone, youthful structure and a quite lengthy finish. Only two barrels of this wine were produced, one new French oak and one neutral barrel. Aged for 22 months and bottled unfined and unfiltered.

2016 Trespass Merlot

25 cases produced – A “No Limits” Exclusive

This lively Merlot has aromatics packed full of ripe blue fruit that enters the nose very seductively! The intoxicating mixture, once it enters the mouth, is nothing short of fantastic. The oak, clove, cinnamon and cardamom spices all intermingle to create a scene from a bakery during the winter holiday season. Cinnamon toast and rolls, allspice and anise. It’s all in there and shouts Merlot! Always a treasure when we bottle some of these grapes on their own, so grab a few bottles quickly. Aged for 22 months in a new French oak barrel, then bottled unfined and unfiltered.

We will enjoy the lovely fall weather ahead…..the warm afternoons, long shadows and vibrant colors of the vineyards. The vines have worked hard and can now rest, and we couldn’t be more excited about this 20th vintage! Thank you all for enjoying the result of the dedicated farming and vintner life we love and we are flattered that we get to be a part of your wine enjoyment.

Cheers to all,
~ Dana & Donny Gallagher

2019 Spring Release

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Dear Friends,

Beginning a new growing season always brings a sense of excitement and a long “to do” list. This year marks the 20th harvest we will have for Trespass Vineyard. The time has certainly flown by and we still love being farmers and winemakers. What a special way to connect with the world on so many levels. As I write this letter, our vineyard is quietly about to burst forth after a very wet, cool winter. We pruned the vineyard a little later than usual because of the rains, so that always delays budbreak. This doesn’t necessarily delay harvest in the fall as so many variables come into play over the growing season as a whole.

When we look back to the beginning of this project, our original idea was one Bordeaux blend wine from the three grape varietals we grow on our five acres. However, with that very first vintage in 2000, we decided to bottle both a 100% Cabernet Sauvignon and a 100% Cabernet Franc instead. (The Merlot wasn’t yet ready to play!) That one decision to focus on the individual varietals first set a course for us from that point forward and helped put Trespass Vineyard on the list of exceptional small producers staying true to their terrior! We couldn’t be more flattered to be part of that group.

The spring release is Cabernet Franc time!! Following are Donny and Kirk’s notes about the wines, all of which have our beloved varietal included in their blend. Available to order now on a first come, first serve basis.

2016 Trespass Cabernet Franc

125 cases produced

A lofty wine with big aspirations, the 2016 Cabernet Franc is built for the long haul. A red berry finesse along with cherry, tobacco and sandalwood permeates the nose with what one expects from this varietal, but with a tannic structure and phenolic complexity that will carry it for years to come. Brooding fleshy fruit on the mid palate with a creamy raspberry, smooth and lingering on the finish. This varietal does so well at the Trespass Estate site, I always wish for more! It’s a winery favorite every year and a cellar library favorite at home. 100% Cabernet Franc aged for 22 months in 80% new French oak and bottled unfiltered and unfined.

2016 Trespass MAYHEM

125 cases produced

A beautiful blend of 50% Cabernet Franc and 50% Merlot, this is a very sensory diverse Right Bank blend. It leads with spice and dried currants with a smooth yet lavish mouthfeel. A powdery cherry sweet tart with a touch of cinnamon with grilled meats. What a beautiful and interesting wine, full of enjoyment and only five barrels produced! Some time given to this wine will certainly add to the complexity, but even now it is drinking beautifully. Aged for 22 months in 75% new French Oak, bottled unfiltered and unfined.

2016 Trespass INTRIGUE

75 cases produced

In a slight departure from our usual Intrigue blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, we have gone rogue with this vintage – a more typical Bordeaux blend. One third each of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot, this wine is wild, powerful and exciting with youthful granular tannins and muscle! The ripeness has an awesome and understated power to it. The nose is focused and shows outward clove cooking spices and on the palate, hints of espresso roast and dark brownie chocolate. A deep, rich, savory and fun wine for sure that should stretch for many years to come! A smaller production this year with on 75 cases made. Aged in 75% new French oak, bottled unfiltered and unfined.

2016 Trespass MISCHIEF

125 cases produced

Donny just can’t resist getting his hands on some great fruit and blending in the barrel stacks! This Bordeaux blend is a direct cousin to our Rendezvous with 50% Cabernet Franc and 50% Cabernet Sauvignon, but sourced from two other well respected vineyards. The Stagecoach Cabernet Sauvignon and Sugarloaf Franc from southeastern Napa Valley work beautifully together to create this wine. Opening with dark red fruit, deep black cheery and blackberry preserves! This wine hangs on the balance of fantastically playful and on a more serious side, it has enormous aromatics as an array of pleasure wafts from the glass. With years to build on, this wine will become more savory with some olive notes that will eventually make their way in and hence refine the wine in an incredible way! Aged for 22 months in 75% new French oak and bottled unfined, unfiltered.

Please feel free to reach out to us anytime, we truly love hearing from all of you! We have recently received emails about how our older wines are being enjoyed and it means so much to us (and usually a trip deep into the cellar to try a bottle ourselves!) One collector told us how beautifully our 2003 Cabernet Franc was drinking which has prompted the idea of a grand library tasting later this summer. Watch our website for our reviews on each vintage later in the year.

We raise a glass to all of you and a wonderful 20th vintage ahead!

~ Donny and Dana Gallagher

2018 Fall Release

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Dear Trespass Friends,

We have just finished with harvest and the 2018 vintage is happily fermenting at the winery! The vineyard is basking in the golden light of fall, its hard work completed for the year! What a wonderful growing season we have enjoyed. There were no real weather extremes, which allow the fruit to gain beautiful flavors and balance. Now we can reflect a bit and turn our attention to the release of the final wines from the 2015 vintage. We have three wines for you to add to your cellar this fall as well as two favorites from our Spring release if you would like to restock.

One question we often get is what would be the “optimum” aging for our wines to enjoy them at their peak. As you all know, we like to make our wines to be enjoyed shortly after release; however Donny would say that his personal “sweet spot” is when the wines reach six to eight years old. We have been pulling out some older vintages lately to enjoy with friends and so we can speak from experience! During the upcoming winter when activity slows a bit in the vineyard, we plan to set up a more formalized vertical tasting of our wines with our winemaker Kirk Venge, and we will happily report back to you all what our thoughts are and what wines are just singing right now!

Below are the compiled tasting notes from Kirk and Donny. They independently taste the wines and write their thoughts, which we then blend into what you see below! We just can’t get away from that blending metaphor, can we.

2015 Trespass Cabernet Sauvignon

150 cases produced

This is a beautiful expression of what a premium Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon should be! Upon opening this wine you are immediately captivated by the aromas, fresh with blackberry, boysenberry and oak spice. This deep purple wine delivers on the palate as well, bright entry with mature dark wild berry fruit. The finish is complete, with robust tannin that goes on and on. Decant and drink now, or cellar onward toward 15 to 20 years. From a low yielding vintage comes a very high quality wine, just not a lot, so grab some now!
100% Cabernet Sauvignon aged for 22 months in 80% new French oak.

2015 Trespass Rendezvous

125 cases produced

Massive, intense and seductive! We are very excited about this release of our 50-50 co-fermented blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. (Always Donny and Kirk’s favorite) There are layers and layers that are generous and profound with purity of black fruit and exotic expressions. The aromatics are right! Light scorched herbs, barrel toast, black cherry jam and sweet plumbs. On the palate it is explosive and fills every corner of the palate with blackberry and vanilla, soft and round, but with firm tannins. This wine keeps evolving in the glass, showing great complexity, Wow! Fermented and aged for 22 months in 100% new French oak.

2015 Trespass Old Vine Zinfandel

150 cases produced

This 115 year old vineyard is producing some of the best Zinfandel grapes in the Napa Valley! We feel lucky to have been able to consistently procure this fruit each year. This classy Zin has a focus on the “pretty” core fruit. The 50% new French oak supports and brightens seamless red fruits of wild berry, currant, dried cherry and fresh raspberry. On the palate we have plum jam with a touch of clove and Christmas spice. Not pushy in the least, this is a very nice elegant Zinfandel.

Please feel free to call us any time if you have questions on these new releases or want to inquire about large format bottles or older vintages. We try to keep a few treasures tucked away! As we rush towards the end of the year and happy gatherings ahead, we wish you all the best and many thanks for letting Trespass be a part of your world. We are so grateful you enjoy what we love creating!

We look forward to hearing from you!

Dana & Donny Gallagher

2018 Spring Release

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Dear Trespass Friends,

Welcome to our Spring Release and the first peek at our 2015 vintage Estate wines! The yields from our vineyard and across the Napa Valley were lower than average once again as we worked through an unprecedented fourth year of drought. However the resulting flavors were spectacularly concentrated and we are very proud of the wines we have created. You will notice for some of the wines we have half the production we had in previous years. We will fill orders on a first come basis, so please order soon.

Life has been extremely busy in the vineyard since the last harvest as we began phase one of a twelve year process to replant portions of our vineyard. Our overriding directive was to retain the character and quality of the wines we produce, so we made the conscious decision to only remove small blocks as needed. We are also using our own budwood for the Cabernet Franc specifically, because as we know (and have been told by several consultants) the particular clone we have is “magic”! We won’t take a crop from these new vines for four years, so a lot of TLC and patience is required of us.

Now, on to the Spring releases!!

Below are our tasting notes on the four wines available to you for shipment right away.

2015 Trespass Cabernet Franc – 75 cases produced

Winemaker Kirk Venge describes this wine as the “philosopher” of the estate. Dark and brooding with chocolatey tannins, it nonetheless conveys a savory vanillin warmth. Toasty blueberry on the nose along with mocha, fresh cut sage and toasty sandalwood. Rich flavors of milk chocolate covered blueberries and a wonderful spice box of nutmeg and clove fill the pallet. As usual this wine is 100% Cabernet Franc aged in 80% new French oak for 22 months.

2015 Trespass MAYHEM – 50 cases produced

Donny’s baby to be sure, he describes this wine as “elegance in the glass”. A savory nose wafting with dark cocoa that evolves on the palate with ripe berries, blue fruit, black currant and layers of dusty cocoa and violets. The finish is long and lingering. Absolutely perfect with either a delicious filet or our favorite Skuna Bay salmon steak! A blend of 55% Cabernet Franc and 45% Merlot aged for 22 months in 80% new French oak.

2017 Fall Release

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Dear Friends,

I had written our fall release letter and was preparing to send it out when life in the wine country took a dramatic change. The crisp, clear mornings usually filled with the exciting hustle and bustle of the picking crews were transformed into smoke filled skies. The sheer magnitude of the devastation came trickling in as we were without power for almost two days in St. Helena. As the fires spread and anxiousness prevailed in our community, all we could do was get prepared to leave then wait and watch.

We were fortunate to have no lasting effects from these fires, but we know of so many friends and valley neighbors who have been displaced and lost their homes. The stories are heartbreaking. However the common thread has been the overwhelming gratitude to the first responders who came to fight these fires. We are all truly humbled by their dedication to protect us! The focus of the firefighters both on the ground and in the air was awe inspiring. Each day as the flames glowed on the ridges above us, the constant air attacks held back any advancement into St. Helena.

As I write this it is the first day in almost two weeks that the sky is no longer smoky. A bit of light rain is in the forecast this evening. Mother Nature will now begin her work to heal the valleys. Our community is strong and will pull together to heal each other. We are blessed to have an opportunity to do what we can with this process.

This fall we have the final three of our 2014 wines to share with you, our Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel, and the Rendezvous Blend. As a special treat for our “No Limits” allocation level we have a fourth wine, a one barrel lot of 2014 Merlot that is available only to you as well as a few cases of magnums of the wines in this release. As always, Donny and our winemaker Kirk Venge have compiled their notes on the wines which you will find on the reverse side.

So many of you have reached out to us over the past few weeks to check in, to send your thoughts and prayers and we can’t thank you enough. The both of us consider ourselves lucky to call all of you friends. As we wrap up this harvest season we are finding that we are taking things a bit slower and appreciating the smallest of details that surround us each day. We wish the same for all of you this fall season.

With Love,
Dana & Donny

2016 Fall Newsletter

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Dear Trespass Friends,

The beautiful fall season is upon us and it is time to celebrate a fabulous harvest and the release of the last of our Trespass Vineyard wines from the 2013 vintage!! The Cabernet Sauvignon, Old Vine Zinfandel, and the Rendezvous blend are ready to make their way from our cellar to yours.

Heritage and legacy are themes that resonate deeply in our business, as well as all kinds of farming. After all we are simply stewards of our special piece of land, a responsibility Donny and I keep in our minds at all times. Our property had been under vine for over 100 years, however when we purchased it the old “Italian field blend” varietals had been ripped out. We were able to make rootstock and clonal selections that we felt would prosper in this unique corner of St. Helena and have been aptly rewarded!

Many of you have asked if any of our children plan to get into the wine business. One has not fallen far from the vine. Our son Michael has been making wine since 2010 and his brand is called MTGA. I can’t believe he just released his fourth vintage! Check out his wonderful wines at mtgawines.com and get a few bottles to try. And don’t miss reading his blog – I always enjoy his perspectives and his journey. (Yes, a proud Mom moment!) The other four in our “Brady Bunch” have now scattered in different directions but you just never know what may happen around the corner. We are always happy to send wine care packages their way so they always have a taste of home nearby.

The 2013 is a vintage of the ages and was one of the most concentrated in quite some time. Donny likes to say the silver lining from the drought conditions we had experienced for several years is that the wines made during this time have been richer, bolder, and more concentrated than ever. Fortunately we have returned to a more normal weather pattern in the Napa Valley, but it is Mother Nature’s annual stamp that marks each vintage as a special moment in time for Trespass Vineyard.