Far Mountain, Fission Cabernet Sauvignon 2020, Moon Mountain District

Far Mountain was founded by Chilean winemaker Rodrigo Soto and his wife Mai Errazuriz in 2018. Having spent decades working for leading wineries across the Americas, the couple established this project believing that the remote pockets of the Sonoma Valley mountains had the potential to make some of California’s most exciting wines. At Far Mountain, he has continued to draw on his vast knowledge of biodynamic farming, working closely with likeminded growers in Sonoma’s Moon Mountain District AVA to slowly introduce the practice. Rodrigo and Mai seek to capture the truest expression of these vineyards in the cellar, by using low-intervention winemaking and minimal new oak. The Fission Cabernet Sauvignon is sourced from the Alta Vista vineyard, high up in the Moon Mountain District AVA, at 300 metres above sea level in the Sonoma Valley. The vines are fifty years old and have never been irrigated, both rare qualities in California, and continue to produce exceptional fruit at twice the age that most vines in California need to be replanted. This is helped by deep 20 - 40 feet root systems, the volcanic bedrock of decomposed granite on which the vines lie and the cooling, high-elevation breezes. This combination lends the Cabernet Sauvignon a defined structure with an elegant, graphite-mineral profile.

This wine displays intense and ripe black fruits along with earthy and mineral characters, and a seamless, silky flow through the mid-palate. A sappy concentration and powerful, yet refined tannins remain on the structured finish. The name Fission was ultimately chosen to reference the textural and mineral characteristics the volcanic soils bring to the wine.