Dry Beginnings

Atacama Station

Before we owned our Blind River Vineyard, it was Atacama Station 🐑⁠

Named after one of the driest places on earth, the Atacama Desert in Chile.⁠

Pictured: Sheep farmer, Ted Kearney

Images from nzgeo.com

1990s

Blind River is a small sub-region found South of Awatere. Inland from the sea, climbing towards the inland Kaikoura ranges, it is cooler, drier, and windier, with a degree of elevation.

Pictured here, the only green you can see is from a leaking water tank, veinlike dripping down the hillside.

Over the years, skilled viticulture and a unique climate and soil combination have ensured this subregion’s status as a key player in Marlborough's wine.

Today

Turns out, our grapes love this site! It may be one of Marlborough's driest sub-regions, but the soils here are deep, with free-draining loams over clay-mixed gravels, giving our Sauvignon Blanc concentrated herbaceous notes and producing elegant Pinot Gris.