This is Astrolabe winemaker Simon Waghorn's delicious take on Albarino and it's made from grapes grown in a quirky location, to say the very least. All grapes in this wine were hand picked from their coastal home at Kekerengu, on the coast south of Blenheim. It is the southernmost vineyard in the Marlborough region and only Astrolabe makes wine from the small vineyards planted there. This cool location provides slighter higher acidity and zestiness to the wines made from there.

Whole bunch pressing and fermentation on solids followed by lees aging provides this wine with depth and body, which balances the naturally high acidity that is innate to the Albarino grape - a native grape to north west Spain and Portugal and now at home in New Zealand. 

Flavours in this wine are all about green apples and lemon with a green olive note on its dry finish. 

This is the ultimate wine to drink with seafood on a hot day.

The story of Astrolabe

Diversity, history and family ownership are among the reasons to try the outstanding range of wines from Astrolabe, which was founded in 1996 in Marlborough by winemaker Simon Waghorn and his partner in life and wine, Jane. 

Simon has forged a reputation for being one of New Zealand's most respected producers of aromatic white wines after winning an almost embarrassingly long string of awards for his Sauvignon Blancs. He has also forged a name for adventurously diverse winemaking - he produces dry flinty whites from the most southern vineyard in Marlborough at Kekerengu on the coast about an hour's drive south of Blenheim. He is the only winemaker to produce wines from here. 

He is also one of the few in this country to make Albarino, Chenin Blanc and a consistently outstanding range of wines from the organically certified hillside sloping site that is the Wrekin Vineyard in Marlborough. 

The winery remains family owned and is now run by two generations, including Simon and Jane as well as their adult daughters.