A New American Appellation: Rockpile

Sheriff Tennessee Carter Bishop was a hard man. Back in the 1870s, he took prisoners from the Sonoma County jail and put them to work building a road from Dry Creek Valley to his remote mountain ranch.

The sheriff called his ranch the Rock Pile, possibly after 1,751-foot Rockpile Peak nearby, and the road became known as Rockpile Road. Little did Sheriff Bishop know that in the fullness of time he would also be naming Sonoma County’s 12th American Viticultural Area.

The new Rockpile AVA was approved on April 29. But its pending establishment has been well-known in the wine world, and several wineries already offer a taste of the new appellation. Look for the word “rockpile” on wine labels from Rosenblum, Seghesio, Carol Shelton, Gary Galleron, St. Francis, Kenwood, Mauritson and Paradise Ridge.

The Rockpile AVA is remarkable for several reasons. One is that, as AVAs go, it’s small. At 13,000 total acres, it’s the second smallest in Sonoma County (Sonoma Mountain is 6,000 acres). It’s the smallest in number of growers (11) and acres of vineyards (200).

Small is good on a viticultural map, where the ultimate goal is to draw lines that correspond to impressions on the palate. The less geographically specific an AVA is, the less viticultural meaning it has. Many AVAs, created simply as marketing tools, are too general to tell the consumer anything about what’s in the bottle. A closely defined AVA is more likely to be truly distinctive.

Just Vines

Another unusual thing is that Rockpile is the only Sonoma County AVA without any wineries. But then, it doesn’t need any--wineries outside the appellation are clamoring for Rockpile fruit. And in Northern California, where the typical wine producer purchases well over half its grapes from independent growers, an all-grower AVA makes perfect sense.

Why all the interest in Rockpile? In two words, intensity and structure. Rockpile fruit hits the palate like a laser beam, perfectly defined but complex. Around the world, mountain-grown fruit is used for giving extra weight and authority to blended wines. When those wines are bottled on their own, they can be stunning.

Carol Shelton’s Rocky Reserve Zinfandel is a good example. It’s a huge wine by any standard, gushing with flavor, but it’s nimble on the palate--another sip is simply compulsory.

The keys here are altitude and proximity to the ocean. Like most mountain appellations, Rockpile is largely defined by elevation. All the vineyards are higher than 800 feet above sea level, and most are between 1,000 and 2,000 feet. That puts them above the fog level, where they bask in long, warm days tempered most afternoons by a brisk wind from the nearby Pacific Ocean. A dramatic drop in temperature during the night preserves grape acidity.

Naturally for those conditions, the vineyards are almost entirely in red grapes, mostly Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon. The sea-kissed fruit ripens prodigiously, developing a distinctive combination of deep color, concentrated flavor, thick tannin and vibrant acidity. Wines made from those grapes also have distinctive succulence--the same kind of savory quality expressed by Russian River Valley Pinot Noirs and Zinfandels, but in a more massive context. They can show the same kind of muscular elegance as a great athlete.

Rockpile is new in another way. All of its vineyards have been planted in the last 10 years, and Rockpile fruit has only been available in decent quantities since the late 1990s. You could call it an instant appellation. But it does meet one of the primary requirements for an AVA: Grapes have historically been grown there.

A survey document from 1872 mentions a bearing vineyard on Bishop’s land. Because grapevines don’t usually yield fruit until their third year, it can be assumed that the vineyard was planted in the 1860s, possibly right around the time Gen. Robert E. Lee was cantering old Traveler up the muddy road to Appomattox Court House back in Virginia.

Unfortunately, Bishop’s vines fared little better in the long run than the Army of Northern Virginia in the Civil War. You can still find vine stakes among the oaks and firs on the forested Rockpile slopes, but the area produced virtually no wine grapes during most of the 20th century.

The current revival began in 1992, when retired UC Berkeley Vice Chancellor Rod Park and his wife, Cathy, planted vines near their home on the historic Bishop homestead. The Park vineyard is about 2,000 feet in elevation. It’s been known to snow there in late spring, when the vines are already pushing out new shoots to begin the growing season.

The Parks planted Cabernet, Merlot and Petite Verdot. Paradise Ridge Winery produced a wine from each variety in 2001. The Merlot is particularly outstanding, larger than life with opulent perfume and flavor, a plush, slightly nubby texture and a chiseled structure.

Around the same time the Parks were planting, vintner Kent Rosenblum collaborated with viticulturist Jack Florence Jr. to plant Zinfandel on the Florence family property. The bud wood came from an old Zinfandel vineyard near St. Peter’s Church in Cloverdale, one of the oldest producing vineyards in California; it is thought to have been planted in Bishop’s day.

Solid and Supple

Rosenblum’s Rockpile Road Zinfandels are perhaps the quintessential Rockpile expression in the way they reconcile opposing forces. The ‘01, which will be released early next year, is lush yet as clear as stained glass, with an intense complex of well-defined flavors. The tannin is thick but supple, and there’s a kind of tenderness in the powerful finish. The Petite Sirah ’01 from the same vineyard shows the same qualities with more black pepper and savory herb notes.

Rosenblum winemaker Jeff Cohn has an impressive JC Cellars Syrah ’01 from vines planted in 1997 by Jack Florence Sr. It displays the savory intensity of coastal mountain fruit with a spiciness that evokes the rocky vineyards of the northern Rhone.

Mick Lumetta planted his five acres of St. Peter’s Church selection Zinfandel in 1995, with about 5% Petite Sirah inter-planted in the field blend tradition. Like his vines, Lumetta has had to struggle to get established. He had to halt construction of his house while a mountain lion gave birth in the cellar. When the baby lions were old enough to run, California Fish & Game rangers chased the family off, and construction resumed.

Lumetta has a small business in Santa Rosa, but his heart is in his vineyard. Growing grapes has been a dream since his childhood in Michigan, he says.

“We’d go to the Eastern Market in Detroit, and wait for the train to come in from California so we could buy a ton of grapes to make wine. My father used to say, ‘Someday you’ll own vines in California.’ And that was always my goal in life.”

Seghesio Vineyards has been buying Lumetta’s fruit. It lends structure, tannin and luminous depth of flavor to the Seghesio Lumetta Vineyard Zinfandel. But winemaker Ted Seghesio likes the fruit so much he bottled 24 cases of Lumetta Zin for sale in the winery tasting room. It’s a lovely wine, with the signal combination of tender berry flavor and robust tannin.

Gary Branham, a Sutter Home winemaker, planted three acres of Zin in a remote location near the Mendocino County line in 1993. Napa Valley consulting winemaker Gary Galleron has made several spectacular wines from the fruit. The ’99 Galleron “Branham Vineyard” Zin has a ravishing perfume and flavor of ripe berries, roses, and spice over big, smooth tannin. The ’01 is a step up in power, yet is still an elegant wine.

Roughing It

Rockpile is as challenging for people as for grapes. Many residents are entirely off the grid, with no utilities or infrastructure, struggling right along with their vines. Rod and Cathy Park typically run their generator a couple hours during the day to keep a bank of batteries charged up. The house and the pumps run off the batteries.

“It turns out to be cheaper than PG&E;,” says Rod Park.

It’s hard to imagine people living up there before automotive transportation. Even now, it’s a good 40-minute drive to the nearest store--and it’s not much of a store. Back then, going to town for supplies would have meant two days of rugged travel.

Still, says Cathy Park, “There were more people up here right after the Gold Rush than there are now.”

There may have been a store back in those days. There was a post office, called Throop--the Parks have an old envelope with a Throop postmark. Rockpile Road remains the AVA’s only road, and only about half of it is paved.

That’s significant. If the area had been more easily settled, with trophy houses on expensive acreage, it might have become just another Cabernet-Chardonnay bank, or perhaps vines wouldn’t have been established at all.

As it is, Rockpile is a challenge--still pioneer country.