2023 Gratus Estate White Rhone Blend Napa Valley

Pope Valley is the Napa most tourists never see. No tasting rooms lining the highway, no tour buses.

Just steep limestone hillsides, hot days, cold nights, and some of the most serious small-production farming in the county. That's where Thomas Wargovich planted his vineyard.

Thomas was a cardiac surgeon — and before that, a botany and biology student at West Virginia University. He purchased this 27-acre parcel in Pope Valley in 2001 and spent the next four years fighting through permitting before he could plant a single vine.

He also enrolled at Napa Valley College, completed their viticulture and enology program, and eventually landed an internship at O'Shaughnessy Estate on Howell Mountain under winemaker Sean Capiaux. The estate is now a living arboretum alongside the vineyard — over 1,000 trees, including 300+ rare and endangered conifer species, many on the IUCN critical list. He named his winery GRATUS — Latin for gratitude.

Napa makes an ocean of Chardonnay. It makes almost no Marsanne.

Gratus planted Rhône whites up in Pope Valley when every neighbor said Sauvignon Blanc. 50% of Grenache Blanc, the rest: Roussanne, Marsanne, Viognier, Picpoul Blanc. Five varieties, ten estate acres, a few hundred cases a year.

The wine is deep gold with real aromatic lift. Honeysuckle, honeycomb, quince, golden apple, a saline edge behind it. The palate runs apricot, peach, pineapple and Asian pear.

There is weight here without heaviness, and the finish dries out with a light grip.