Alheit Cartology Chenin Blanc looks alive and bright, pale gold in colour. Citrus rind and pear ring clear on the nose. There’s a faint herbal and stony echo and some soft cardamon-like spice here too. The palate is sappy and layered, fine and dry with lovely cleansing acidity. Long finish.
Winemaker's notes: "This is the tenth bottling of Cartology, making it a rather special milestone for us. I personally put a great deal of thought into the assembly of this wine, wanting to bottle something beautiful to celebrate the tenth vintage."

Cartology is a vinous exploration of Cape heritage. It’s intended to be a picture of the Cape seen through the lens of her old vineyards in a given vintage. The cuveé is composed of rare and extraordinary parcels of mature dryland bushvines, of heritage grapes, namely Chenin Blanc and Sémillon. These grapes have been planted in the Cape for centuries. Cartology has become our staple offering. It serves as a poster child for our project, and also seems to have become a flag bearer for Cape heritage wine in general.

As a rule, the Cartology parcels are dry-farmed bush vines, with a minimum age of thirty years, although most are between forty and fifty years old. Average yields for these parcels is around 3 tons/Ha or around 20hl/Ha.

Cartology 2020 is 93% Chenin blanc and 7% Sémillon. The Chenin comes from our parcels in the Skurfberg, Perdeberg, Upper Blaauwklippen, False Bay and Tygerberg. The Sémillon comes from the old La Colline block in Franschhoek.

The grapes are hand sorted and whole bunch pressed. The juice is very lightly settled (we like very cloudy raw juice) with no additions to the raw juice, wild fermentation in either cements eggs, clay pots, foudres, or old barrels (various sizes). Fermentation can last anywhere between 3 weeks and 11 months. The wine is kept on lees for around twelve months, then rested in tank on fine lees without fining for a further six months prior to bottling. Very simple, careful winemaking.