The Boneline

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Season update: Summer 2015-16.

Early December flowering raced through with hot dry days and warm over night temperatures and a good fertilisation occurred with a good balanced crop with a lot of “hen and Chicken”the big berry / little berry bunch structure that gives good intense flavour. Even set with little variation within the bunches made for an attractive looking crop. The drought continued into the New Year with the river flow hitting its low flow cut off point twice but each time it rained that evening and the river flow was restored by the next morning. The drought was finally broken  on the 3rd of January with 50 mm of rain followed by 10 mm on the 16th and 35 mm on the 20th. So by maintaining good early soil moisture levels and with beneficial rainfall, good growth has occurred to support our balanced crop.

2015 Air New Zealand Wine Awards

Following on from its recent success at the Best Awards – winning Gold Pins for design, The Boneline 2014 Waimanu Pinot Noir has just been awarded gold at the 2015 Air New Zealand Wine Awards.

We’ll drink to that…

2015 Best Awards

The Boneline recently won gold at the Designers Institute of New Zealand’s Best Awards — the annual showcase of excellence in graphic, spatial, product and interactive design. Gold pins were awarded for both packaging and small scale identity and silver for design craft (photography). Judges Comments — Packaging: Dark and mysterious – this wine feels like a new discovery and there is no doubt at all that the design, along with the product, comes from this land. Judges Comments — Identity: Resourceful and beautiful. A clear single idea that is as rich and layered as the liquid inside the bottles.

Season update: Spring 2015

We had a normal start for bud burst, ( in the 1st week of October) with none of the early bud break / late frost combination that affected the previous vintage. We went straight into good weather, left winter well behind, and launched into a hot dry spring. Although we heard the frost fans and helicopters performing in the lower valley on at least 6 mornings, our lowest temperature was + .7 degrees Celsius and we were 1.7 degrees away from the point that frost damage occurs. We moved into a good even bud break, with lots of flowers set and ready to go. The El Niño conditions and the drought that had effected the later half of the last vintage had continued over the winter and into spring while we waited for the drought to break.

Bittersweet Sympathy

The Boneline Sympathy Orchestra was started by Bryn, Gary and Lindsay to get Gary started on tenor ukulele. Bryn plays a banjo mandolin (that belonged to Lindsay’s grandfather) and Lindsay plays guitar. They play a mixture of covers from Johnny Cash, Sun session Elvis and a mix of old time country, raucous rockabilly and rock classics that anyone can easily play and sing along to. Over the last few years many others have joined them, Adam on Vocals, Christa on soprano ukulele and Eric on banjo are regulars and occasionally Jeff drops in on drums. Over 20 other people have joined them on many occasions and numerous family and friends have sat in and sung songs. Fuelled by craft beer and laughter their goal is to play acoustic, depression era, crumby, street style music. The songs must be correct and tuneful but sound like things are falling apart, an effect they have admirably achieved. Competitive endings where one player struggles to dominate and “have the last say “are a feature of their private woolshed performances.