The Vintage
The 2006 vintage in Bordeaux was characterised by unusually variable conditions late in the season, although before this it looked to be heading towards being a very good vintage indeed. Winter experienced the highest rainfall levels in 30 years, partially rehydrating the soil after the drought of 2005. A cold late winter delayed budburst until early-mid April, whilst flowering was rapid and successful in a hot and dry June. During a very hot July the vine's development was all but shut down to accommodate an early start to veraison, in which the grapes change colour.
Much of August was spent under cloud, cooler than usual, meaning that the continuing veraison was sporadic and prompting a green harvest in many vineyards. The positive side to this summer cool period was that the white grapes maintained a fresh acidity.
September began with fine weather and excellent white grapes were picked. This warm weather also gave the red grapes a much needed increase in ripeness, in the end comparable to '03 and '05. August had helped a high acidity to be maintained, giving exceptionally high quality, balanced fruit.
As the early harvesting of Merlot was about to begin, however, storms arrived. Harvesting eventually began in late September, before storms returned in October to further jeopardise the potentially outstanding vintage. Conditions during harvest meant rot was never far away, and those châteaux who employed rigorous selection and sorting performed best.
Médoc
If we can be forgiven for making some rather sweeping generalisations, here they are: Pauillac performed very well indeed. As the natural home of the Cabernet grape, whose thicker skin coped better with the rains than Merlot, this is understandable.
St-Julien did well too; perhaps a touch more elegance achieved here than in Pauillac. There was more variable quality in St-Estèphe (I note we said the same in the 2005 vintage report) where a few seemed to struggle with ripeness. But there were also a wide variety of styles among the good wines on offer. Calon Ségur and Cos d'éstournel spring to mind as two very good wines made in contrasting styles.
Finally, and similarly to St-Estèphe, Margaux was variable, with some of the lesser wines tasted in April showing green edges. However, again, there were notable exceptions and triumphs; in a vintage where Merlot generally struggled, Château Palmer is blended with 40% Merlot to wonderful effect.
Graves and Pessac-Léognan
Haut-Brion and La Mission stood out wonderfully in this appellation. In particular their rare whites were phenomenal - as good as they've ever been? - as were many whites from other producers, so this year we hope to offer our biggest ever range of dry white Bordeaux. The rest of the reds were mixed, which is why you won't see a big range this year.
St-Emilion and Pomerol
It's not really fair to group these two neighbouring appellations this year, so pronounced were the differences. St Emilion clearly struggled. Stand out wines were again predictable, but it was difficult at the generic Union des Grands Crus tastings to get excited about some of the unripe tannins.
Pomerol, on the other hand, was crowned the most consistent and generally best received appellation of the whole Bordeaux region this year. The vineyard calendar generally runs a week earlier here than in St-Emilion, allowing the majority of the grapes to be harvested in early September's fine weather before the rains. The generic tasting was very enjoyable and the consistency remarkable. The wines have a lovely richness and ripe fruit character.
Sauternes and Barsac
One would have thought that while the rest of Bordeaux was fighting off botrytis before harvest, growers in Sauternes would be reporting a wonderful year. We weren't blown away overall - much like elsewhere, a few top properties have performed well, whilst many wines disappointed.
The Market
Prices, prices, prices - these were as unpredictable as ever. The quality of wine is clearly not as uniformly spectacular as last year, but it is good. A (very) few wines even outperform the 2005s. One factor at work is how much a particular wine increased in price between the 2004 and 2005 vintages. If the increase was modest, then we expected only a modest decrease this year. However, if the increase was significant (over 300% in some cases) then the decrease this year should be expected to reflect this.
Interestingly, many of the Château owners we met while tasting dismissed the importance of the buyers in Asia that suggested instead that it was the UK that had driven the market in 2005. Pressure from all corners of the UK trade in favour of price decreases seems only to have been partially acknowledged.
In truth, the price difference on last year varied significantly. The top wines were undoubtedly historically expensive, but there are bargains and rewarding purchases throughout our carefully selected range of 2006 Bordeaux.