The Bay Beyond

There’s a lot more to Hawke’s Bay than Gimblett Gravels – but is further sub-regionality justified? Oliver Styles looks at the cases for and against

- Oliver Styles

TALK TO ALMOST any winemaker in New Zealand’s Hawke’s Bay and they are convinced that sub-regionality exists. As mike Henley, chairman of Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers, points out, the Gimblett Gravels – the established sub-region par excellence – is better known than its parent area in some parts of the Us. But the Gravels has several things going for it: the soil type is reasonably unique; it is easily delineated (more or less within two roads and a riverbank); and it has several heavyweight companies behind it, including Craggy Range and Villa Maria.

Yet the sub-regional story seems to have stopped there. since the success of the Gimblett Gravels Association, only two other regions have been officially drawn up: the Bridge Pa Triangle and the Te mata special Character Zone. But is there a case to be made for examining sub-regionality across the whole region?

Church Road winemaker Chris scott certainly thinks so. ‘Put south Australia over a map of Hawke’s Bay,’ he says, ‘and Adelaide Hills, Eden Valley and Barossa Valley would fit into it. You can be in Gimblett Gravels or Bridge Pa and the temperature on a summer’s day is 30°-32°C, then drive out to Tukituki and it’s 26°C or 27°C. Added to which there’s the differences in soil type…’

Down to earth

What of those soils? Keith Vincent, an expert in soil science, is reluctant to generalise, but broadly speaking there are three soil types in the region: young alluvial (recently repurposed riverbed, such as the Gimblett Gravels); old alluvial (terraced riverbed with ‘ancient, well-developed sandy-silt’ build-up, such as Bridge Pa, Mangatahi and Crownthorpe); and hillside soils (sites are dotted around the Bay, but generally loess over limestone).