(2021) Pioneers of the northen Leyda Valley, I visited Viña Leyda many years ago and was hugely impressed by the measures they had gone to to understand their soils and hillsides, mapping them minutely via 500 inspection pits they had dug to totally understand the soil composition, water retention properties, etc. This Pinot is aged for 10 months in new and second fill French oak and has a sweetly attractive nose, dark and lightly spicy, truffly and earthy, the fruit profile is black, but not heavy. In the mouth the surge of super sweet, ripe and luscious fleshy black berries is delicious, the texture quite plush and the sheen of oak adding to that impression. But again, there is no flabbiness or dead weight here: tannins and acids are brisk, and the savoury, sour cherry edge sharpens the finish.