Welcome

High Elevation Santa Cruz Mountains Pinot Noir & Syrah

From Our Vineyard In The Sky

–

Muns Vineyard brushes the sky on the Loma Prieta ridge top above Monterey Bay at 2600 feet. This is the highest Pinot Noir vineyard in the Santa Cruz Mountains, a prime growing region for this luscious winegrape.

We enjoy the coastal climate of the mountains, with fog lapping at our feet in the summer. The cool coastal breeze that blows off the fog and sunlight are perfect for growing premium Pinot Noir. Moderate days and cool nights, along with diligent personal attention in our 13-acre owner-operated vineyard, produces fruit with rich and complex flavors. We have blended Dijon clones 114, 115, 667 and 777 to provide a complex and well-balanced wine.

Minimal intervention in the winery allows our unique terroir to shine. Barrel aging in 30% new oak for about 16 months adds soft tannins that accentuate, but not dominate, the beautiful fruit in this special wine. The wine drinks well now and is a delicious complement with food, and will bottle-age for years to come. Enjoy ‘heaven-in-a-bottle’ from our ridge top vineyard above the bay!

See more below about:

Vineyard Tasting Dates and More Wine Events

Vineside Pickup & Free Local Delivery

* * *

Harvest, 2024

We started harvest with an early pick at low brix for a Muns Vineyard sparkling wine the week of Aug. 26.. We started picking for our winery clients on September 6 and finished on the 17th. This was earlier than we even started last year, on Oct. 2. Last year, 2023 was a cool growing season and harvest was about a month later than usual. This year’s schedule was more usual.

Although temps were largely moderate, in the low-mid 80s with chilly nights, the fruit ripened quickly. Clusters were plentiful and healthy – gorgeous!, and yield was excellent. Look forward to the 2024 Muns Vineyard Pinot!

Also look forward to the 2024 Sparkling Rosé of Pinot Noir in 2026 with the first disgorgement. We are down to the last few cases of our 2010 Sparkling Rosé of Pinot Noir, which is now on limited allocation to get us through the next year, hopefully. But never fear, the delicious 2024 sparkling will be not far behind!

Earlier in the year:

Veraison started early August (when the sugar levels have increased to the point that the grapes start turning color). Bloom started first of June in the Pinot Noir and by mid-June was about all ‘set’ (meaning the flowers had fertilized and were forming little berries). Clusters were fully formed by mid-July. Ed and the crew netted the week of Aug. 12 to save the clusters from bird predation (we leave an exit door at the ends of the rows so they can fly out if they get inside the netting).
.

Shortly after dawn.
Harvest 2020 in the time of Covid, masked and socially distanced.
Harvest 2020 in the time of Covid.
Our littlest harvest helper, Skye.

* * *

–

Upcoming Events: Vineyard Tastings, November 2024

Celebrate the 2024 Harvest with These Tastings in the Vineyard:

~ Saturday, Nov. 2

~ Sunday, Nov. 10

Join us to celebrate the 2024 harvest! Raise a glass of our 2010 Sparkling Rosé of Pinot Noir to toast the harvest (complimentary for wine club members). Enjoy a beautiful Autumn day in the vineyard and a tasting outdoors on our deck with its panoramic views overlooking the mountains, Santa Cruz and Monterey Bay. Immerse yourself in our mountain terroir. Our estate Pinot Noirs and Syrah are available mostly direct from us in the vineyard. so this is an opportunity to bring them home to enjoy! Harvest Celebration Tastings: Oct. 12, 13 & 20

And for Wine Club members: It is time for your last delivery of the year. Come on up to a tasting and make your selection. Stay tuned for your wine club notice. We want to get your selection to you before the holidays. Weather permitting we will schedule another couple of tastings in November.

Please make a reservation with your choice of seating times: 12:00-2:00 or 12:30-2:30 (The 1-3:00 seating is booked up both days)

Email Mary at Mary@munsvineyard.com or call 408-234-2079. For details see the Vineyard Tastings page here

Please note: We take reservations only for the dates that we schedule. Tastings are outdoors and are dependent on conducive weather. Tastings may need to be rescheduled in the event of rain, heavy fog, cold temperatures, heat wave or other circumstances that inhibit wine tasting outdoors. We want you to enjoy your visit!

More Events Where You Can Find Us:

~ Sunday, Nov. 17: Las Cumbres Holiday Bazaar

Local artisans. Wine tasting (including Muns Vineyard!). Delicious food. At the Las Cumbres Community Center. A fundraiser for the South Skyline Volunteer Firefighters and South Skyline Firesafe Council. For more information, see the Las Cumbres website here. .
.

~ Sunday, Dec. 8: Aptos Wine Wander

Muns Vineyard will be there! 1-4pm. Tickets $45 in advance. For tickets and more information, see Wines of the Santa Cruz Mountains here.

See our Events page for more events and information.

* * *

Enjoy Muns Vineyard Wines at Home

Vineside Pickup: Pick up Your Advance Order at the Vineyard Saturdays, by Appointment or Free Local Delivery. We also ship.

If you are not able to come to one of our scheduled vineyard tastings you can pick up an order vineside, and we also offer free local delivery.

For Vineside Pickup at the vineyard: Saturdays between 11-3pm: Pick up is for advance orders only so we can fill your order before your arrival.

Free local delivery: We will deliver to your home at no charge with a min. $125 order throughout Santa Cruz to Watsonville, the Santa Cruz Mountains, and San Jose to Palo Alto. If you live just beyond this area please inquire about delivery.

We also ship.

To Order: See our Order page here. Or call Mary at 408-234-2079.

15% off on 6-11 bottles

25% off on a case

30% off on 3 cases

And you can mix your selection and order whatever you would like.

Wine Club discounts: 20% on 3 bottles, 25% on 6 bottles, 30% on a case

Pricing before discounts: Pinot Noirs $44/bottle; Syrah $34/bottle, 2010 Sparkling Rose’ of Pinot Noir $54/bottle.

For a list of our wines, see the Wines page here. To order, see our Order page here. For even better discounts, see our Wine Club page here. Or call Mary at 408-234-2079.

* * *

Harvest 2023

Harvest 2023 starts at 5am.
A sliver moon over the vineyard just before dawn.
Picking in the fog at dawn.
Fog clouds loom over the adjacent ridge.
Dramatic!
It takes about 45 buckets to fill a half-ton bin.
Ed moving bins.
Ed moving bins heading in reverse on the Same crawler.
Early morning and we can see the Monterey peninsula in the background on the other side of the Bay.
The crew picks beautiful Pinot clusters.
Bin full of Pinot.
More Pinot!
Glowing golden leaves and Pinot.
Harvest dawn on the big hill, Santa Cruz and Monterey Bay in the distance.
Skye pup finds lots of sweet treats everywhere!
This Syrah will soon be in the bin.

The 2023 harvest started October 2, at least a full month later than usual due to delayed development throughout the year and the cool Fall (with no major heat waves, yeah!). The cool temps and longer hang-time have contributed to ripening and flavor development with no dehydration – perfect! The Pinot is beautiful and delicious. The 2023 vintage promises to be extraordinary. Harvest is continuing through October. Despite a couple of damp mornings we’ve not had significant rain and it looks like the weather should hold out for us through the month to finish bringing in all the grapes.

Looking back over the year:.

Following a long, cold and wet Spring that delayed bloom by 4-6 weeks the summer sunshine and warming temps have lit a fuse under the vines! In the course of about 10 days from the end of June into the first week of July the vines grew 2-3′, bloom finished and the clusters set. Set is also late by about a month. The crew has tucked up the long canes. And there is a thick layer of straw mulch over the floor left from mowing the heavy growth of cover crop following this winter’s rains. The vineyard is looking beautiful!

Unfortunately we did have some frost damage in the low swales early June (?), which is late for frost and another effect of the long cold Spring weather. Nevertheless, set is looking very good and the crop is looking plentiful with large, full clusters.

This year is like 2019 when we also had a very cold and rainy winter (60″+ in 2019 compared to 80″ this year, and snow in Feb., like this year), a late budbreak, bloom starting mid-June into July and a late set. In 2019 we started harvest mid-late September and we harvested for our Muns Vineyard label Oct. 4 during a cool autumn, finishing up for our winery partners late Oct. Every vintage is different, and brings its unique character to the wine in your glass.

Harvest 2022

Pink dawn over Santa Cruz, harvest day on the Big Hill.
The sky is starting to lighten, lights of Santa Cruz below.
Skye loves to participate.
This hill is steeper than it looks!
Harvest dawn. We've been picking for a couple of hours.
These clusters won't be on the vine much longer.
Moving bins at dawn.
Filling the half ton bin with luscious Pinot.
The 2022 vintage is stellar - large clusters and berries, juicy and delicious!
Ed and co-pilot Skye on the Same crawler.

* * *

Our first day of harvest was Aug. 30 and we picked over two days for several of our winery clients. Everything was ideal, it had been a perfect growing season so far. The berries and clusters were big, beautiful, juicy and delicious. And then we all were hit with that week of 100+ degree weather! That was difficult enough as it was, but grueling to harvest in. Even starting at 4am and ending by noon it still was hot to be out there. We picked on two days during that brutal heat, and then two days the following week when it was so cold in the morning we had to wear a jacket. What a difference from one week to the next!

The good news is that the Pinot remarkably made it through that heat wave, due primarily to irrigation and canopy management. Because of the sunlight at our elevation we do not strip the leaves away from the fruit zone, but instead allow the leaves of the canopy to shade the fruit. In this and prior heat spells this has proved to save the crop, along with diligent irrigation during ripening. We didn’t get away completely without some dehydration, which you can expect in that prolonged heat, but despite it we harvested some beautiful Pinot.

We finished harvest with the Syrah on Sept. 16. We usually harvest the Syrah a week or two after the Pinot, so this was earlier than usual, but the heat precipitated ripening.

2017 also saw a prolonged heat spell just as harvest started (although the preceding winter we were deluged with 85″ of rain, which we haven’t seen in the past couple of years). Our just-released 2017 is fantastic! and the 2022 promises to be, too!

See more on our Vineyard page here.

See our YouTube Channel here for what’s happening in the vineyard – it’s like you are there! Get up close and personal with the crawler and flail mower here .

~ ~ ~

See Muns Vineyard videos on YouTube here: Harvest, Netting, Pruning, Aerial drone view, Mowing, more .

~ ~ ~

———————-

Contact us: info@munsvineyard.com / phone: 408-234-2079

Order on our Order Page here.

Sign up for our monthly newsletter: email info@munsvineyard.com

–