706 THE ADVOCATE
VOL. 80 PART 5 SEPTEMBER 2022
with its unique gravity-fed system where the grape must flows through a
portal from the main floor crush pad (that in off-season converts to the wine
shop) to the tanks below, including a large old milk tank, where it is fermented.
That tank remains from when the property was a dairy farm and
cannot be easily removed, so instead it has been repurposed.
Darren showed us a map of that first Canadian vineyard, planted in 1611
close to the present site of their winery, so that the residents of Port Royal
could have wine to imbibe more regularly. That year, Louis Hebert, the
apothecary at The Habitation in Port Royal, planted it on a hillside in Bear
River. According to Canadian wine expert Tony Aspler’s book Vintage
Canada, Hebert “loaded his canoe with vines he brought with him from
France” and paddled to Bear River “to plant himself a vineyard”.2
This makes Bear River, Nova Scotia the New World’s oldest wine region,
even if it has a long interruption, as those vineyards are long lost to history,
with production in Bear River only recommencing in recent decades.
In the vineyard, they grow a mix of vinifera (Riesling, Pinot Gris and
Pinot Noir among others) and hybrids. We sat at a long table and, along with
our host and his assistant, sampled a number of their wines. In the vineyard,
we looked at the varieties that did well and those that struggled and
spoke of the issues of a small winery production with limited vineyards
(some six acres in this case). There were some recent years where they had
very small crops due to climatic conditions and had to buy grapes from local
growers. Fortunately, recent vintages have been more kind, as they are
focused on producing signature wines from their own vineyard. One pride
of the winery is their Pinot Gris, which is grown only in small quantities
and bottled in 500 ml bottles. I review it below along with one of their red
hybrid blends. We ordered a mixed case of their wines that they obligingly
shipped for $20 once we were home.
Darren Carey outside the winery Basement tank room with the milk tank in the back