Roman heritage?

It is believed by some that this Welsh hillside was once the site of a Roman Vineyard. There is an interesting ‘Roman style’ spring in the vineyard, stone built culverts and an old sunken way on the farm.

If not the Romans, then it is almost certainly the site of Tintern Abbey’s vineyards as good, workable south-facing sites are few and far between in this area.

More recently

The present vineyard was planted in 1979 with subsequent plantings in 1985 and 1989. The total area was about 4 acres when Colin and Judith Dudley purchased it in 1996 from the original owners, Martin and Gay Rogers.

By 1996 the vineyard had been sadly neglected so Colin & Judith had some hard work on their hands to bring it back into production.

It was gradually pruned and cleared and re-staked over 4 years until in 2001 it produced the first good crop of grapes (approx. 5 tonnes). Some of the original plantings were deemed unable to be saved so the vineyard was reduced in size to about 2.5 acres.

After a couple of years it was realised that it was difficult to make a red wine from the late ripening Pinot Noir grape. Colin and Judith decided to plant an earlier ripening red and chose Regent – a modern German hybrid – and between 2002 and 2005 planted 750 winves of this variety.

The vineyard now contains about 4500 vines of 17 different varieties.