Domaine Le Vieux Donjon
Le Vieux Donjon is a fairly new winery by French standards as it was only established in 1966 by Marcel Michel. Prior to that 1966, their fruit was sold to negociants. More recently (since 1979) Vieux Donjon has been managed by Lucien Michel and Marie Jose Lucien Michel, whose parents both owned vineyards in the region, and those holdings were combined to form Le Vieux Donjon as it is known today.
The estate's 15 hectares Southern Rhone vineyard of Vieux Donjon Chateauneuf du Pape are divided as follows; 14 hectares for the production of red Chateauneuf du Pape and 1 hectare for white wine grapes. The most prized parts of the estates holdings are the old vine Grenache, many of which are close to 100 years old. Impressively for such a 'young' estate, more than 33% of the vines are in excess of 100 years old! Vines are planted throughout the Chateauneuf du Pape appellation in Le Pied Long, Bois de Boursan, Champigne, Le Mourre de Gaud and Cabrieres lieux-dits.
Vieux Donjon is organically farmed and makes a very traditional style of Chateauneuf du Pape (they only partially destem the grapes) that is very cellarworthy. The secret (which is really no secret at all) is that they are specialists at picking the grapes from their very old vines only at the precise moment when they've achieved optimum ripeness. Their Chateauneuf du Pape is typically a blend of 75% Grenache, 10% Mourvedre, 10% Syrah and 5% Cinsault and various other grape varieties added in smaller amounts.
"The style of the wines is unashamedly, 'traditionelle' – vins de garde with plenty of backbone and muscle to them. However, these are no clumsy blockbusters, but wines with real definition and elegance underneath powerful exteriors"
- Remington Norman in Rhone Renaissance
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