ABOUT Hitchen Road Vineyard Pokeno new zealand

Hitchen Road Vineyard was established in 1994 by Ken and Patricia Graham to provide Ken, a cardiac surgeon, with a passionate interest for "life after surgery".

Initially, all the viticulture work and wine making were done under contract. We had various ups and downs, largely due to the supply of virused plant material.

In 2002, Ken semi-retired.  We rethought the whole project and with the aid of a chain saw and good clean grafted plants, started again.  The varieties we chose to plant were Pinotage, Malbec, Dolcetto and Chardonnay.  Our next venture was to plant Montepulciano. 

This year we have our first commercial crop of Montepulciano and it's luscious.  Biking through and visiting Italian Vineyards has meant our love affair with Italian varities has continued to grow.  I think we must have brought back a bit of Italian sunshine as these traditionally late ripening grapes ripen well for us.  Perhaps it is just that Pokeno is the Italy of the South? We have now removed the Malbec (even though it got Silver Medals) and replaced it with Sangiovese.

Our first small vintage from our replanting was in 2005 and we have been very proud of our results.  Our wine has been entered in the competition associated with the annual Romeo Bragatto Conference. This is the only competition we enter.  Each year we have received medals and in the latest competition (2009) we received a Bronze Medal for our Pinotage, and Silver Medals for the Dolcetto and Malbec.