– Vintage 2002 –

2002 was another year of weather extremes in Europe. Amidst drought, flood and heavy foehn, Burgenland remained a source of tranquillity, always staying on the bright side. After medium-stage shooting, a dry period with warm temperatures promoted accelerated growth and early flowering. From then on, Petrus’ motto seemed to be “two days of rain, ten days of sunshine”.Thus, the vines did not have to suffer from the annual stress of aridity in July. When the disastrous tempests in August caused Austria’s biggest floodings for decades, our vineyards just received the optimum quantity of 70 liters of rain per square meter.

After some calm days at the beginning of September, the noble rot Botrytis cinerea spread over the white varieties and Zweigelt. This meant a yield reduction of 20% for the latter grape and for dry white wines, as we started picking on September 13th.
Cool night temperatures favored a long harvest period and gave us enough time to handle one vineyard after another with care. Highly ripe white wines with fruity acidity and deeply dark red wines rich in extract with a beguiling dark berry fruit reached the cellar.

On October 9th, the Chardonnay grapes from Ried Gloria, North Burgenland’s highest vineyard, were finally picked. During the rainfall period that followed we feared for the botrytized berries. Around Austria’s national holiday, the ardently desired sunshine came back with a strong, dry wind. The noble-sweet berries shrivelled at a record rate. Chardonnay, Welschriesling und Sauvignon blanc could be harvested for the first time at high Beerenauslese levels, thus topping the 2002 vintage, which yielded even higher average gradations than the year 2000!!!

2002 will pass into the winery’s historic records as producing one of the leading vintages for white, red and sweet wines.