The Oldest Shiraz Vineyard in the World – Langmeil Winery

Click https://spokenwines.com/wines/the-freedom-1843-shiraz to experience the ultimate: a single vineyard wine from what is believed to be the oldest Shiraz vineyard in the world. Let this superb wine whisper you the history of over 180 years in rich layers of flavor, complexity and awe. Share with a very special friend to celebrate, reflect and enjoy.
Driven by quality in every aspect, Langmeil Winery is a must visit either in person or virtually in our story to witness the people, the historic grounds, the ancestral vineyards and its astonishing history. Langmeil is internationally recognized and regarded as one of the top premium wine producers in Australia. In this video you can also learn about other Shiraz wines from Langmeil and experience the progression of wines from 20-30 year old vines, 90 year old vines and this amazing 180 year old vineyard. #bestwine #topwineries

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For the full interview click https://youtu.be/Rj1pxFdSCvM James Lindner and Jonathan Bitter, these two phenomenal story tellers will tell you about the history of the village Langmeil, the Auricht family as one of the first families settling and planting grapes to become the oldest vineyard in the world. James takes you through the boom and bust cycles of the Barossa wine industry and explains the Old Vine Charter. Jonathan explains the history of what led to the creation of the Orphan Bank vineyard and what it took to save the 160 year old vines. And more …

Wines featured in our story, click the link below to order your favorite wine right away from the store in your region.
https://spokenwines.com/wines/the-freedom-1843-shiraz
https://spokenwines.com/wines/orphan-bank-shiraz
https://spokenwines.com/wines/valley-floor-shiraz

0:00 Spoken Wines Intro
0:34 History of Langmeil
3:00 Lindner Family
4:12 The Freedom 1843 Vineyard
8:53 Spoken Wines Reflections
10:38 An extremely rare treasure
11:38 Compare and contrast
12:37 How to Order

[Music]
this is Tammy with spoken wines today we
are taking you to the barasa valley in
South Australia step into a world that
goes back to
1843 and the first settlers planting
grapes imagine sing a wine from these
Vineyards that had become a legend Grace
yourself for a journey to lame mail
Winery home to the oldest shz vines on
Earth taste history that every wine
loving Enthusiast must experience at
least once in their
lifetimes we love to share that the
history of langal because langal is part
of the earliest European history um not
only in the Barosa but in the state of
South Australia so our name L mile um is
is a German derivative um from a village
that was here originally and it was the
village of of the long Mile in English
transl translation if you like so it was
a thriving Metropolis of 12 families
originally uh spread along the River
South Australia is the driest state of
the driest continent outside of
Antarctica um so water was really
important uh and so these little fets is
what they were operated under what was
called the hindorf system so a hoof is a
small farming alotment DWF meaning
Village so small farming Village and
Lang mile was one road it ran parallel
to the river the north par and if you’d
come along that road in the time of the
village you’d have found 12 hoofs which
were relatively narrow but deep farming
allotments stretching from the road back
to the river of the 12 families the most
significant to us was a family called
the ORS because they occupied the land
that we sit on today uh and the
patriarch of the family at the time was
Christian or like all the others uh he
planted various mixed crops and quite
indicative of how these devil FS work he
had a few Acres of some fruit trees a
few Acres of some cereal grains had a
few livestock and he planted Vines we’ve
still got a few Acres of Christians
original planted Vines so that’s the
humble beginnings of how how the the
name arose how the village came to be
and and the beginnings of the wine
industry um but as the baros still
operates today
there’s 60 odd wineries from the really
big ones to the little ones that people
will never hear the names of
unfortunately and I say unfortunately
because they make exceptional wine but
they’re often doing it just for
themselves very small scale um but there
is some nearly 600 odd grow families so
there’s a lot of people make their
living just growing grapes and selling
to wineries uh and that’s how the the
oric family operated in the early years
there was no commercial wiry on the
property for the 90 years so generations
of the orics continued to tend those
Vines uh and just grow the fruit and
sell it um up until
1932 uh and that’s when the the first
commercial wine rink was established on
the property so the Linda family were
part of the first sort of European
settlers actually to the Village of
langar we came across this property in
96 and it was very much um a property
that was incredibly um deric like run
down because it didn’t really get
through the 1980s and no one wanted to
spend any money on it the whole place
was collapsing you know and these are
buildings from the beginning of the the
European settlement to the region one
gene I think that Lind the family have
is an this inherent Gene to actually
attract ourselves to things that need
ref
fixing it’s sort of like oh my God look
at that we need to go and fix that and
we’ve been here building and bringing
this property back to life um and it’s
one thing to be able to preserve some of
the original buildings and the original
you know sort of History you know
thinking that we’re sitting in a
building that was built by the you know
first and second generation of the
European cellists of the region
um but also in a pursuit of making fine
wine you know not only to sort of
represent our region nationally but also
to represent you know great wine
internationally Christian or on this
block settled here in 1842 he planted
bins the following year in
1843 we’ve still got just under three
and a half acres of Christians original
Bard um and we referred to it um as as
the freedom Vineyard because these
people that come here for for their
freedom of Faith um there is a a book of
the family history of the aric family
and it’s called from persecution to
Freedom so when we needed to name that
Vineyard and and give the wine and
nothing um it was your dad wasn’t it it
was James your dad Richard um who uh
said you know that that’s what these WS
are about that’s their Foundation we’ll
call it the freedom viard uh and to this
day we still make a single beyard one
from that is that you know it’s our
understanding and the belief that uh the
freedom of 1843 shiras is actually the
oldest um surviving sort of shiras vard
in the world and my brother uh Paul and
and myself you know it’s our role as
sort of these custodians or caretakers
of this Vineyard is to get that Old Vine
true to the Next Generation the dad was
a bit of a romantic in a lot of ways and
and you know he’d always talk about the
freedom you know being you know what is
a glass of History so the freedom
Vineyard is planted on the on what is
the sort of the banks of the river and
what is surprising though is that
there’s red Clays there um over like
Limestone you know so you know when you
look at a lot of some of these old
ancient soils of of the Barosa um you
know they were SE at some point so
you’ve got this Limestone um and then
you have like um also these like Red
Sands and then you have like red like
red but gravel and then you want another
layer of Reds and then gravel and so
there’s actually all these layers
because of that tap rout because it’s
had to drive the root you know drive to
survive you know down it goes down
through all of that Str and then you get
these side roots that sort of work off
into the different layers of areas this
is where that sort of that um that sort
of complexity and the layers of flavor
come from depending on the season you
know the freedom Vineyard can go
anywhere from like one ton to the acre
um up to two maybe for Lucky 2 point I
think we’ve seen like just over two ton
to the acre when we purchased this
property back in ’96 Paul left his job
came to work for the property and really
started to fix it up clean it up and
he’s very meticulous and this is a you
know if you’re a wine maker that is a
pretty good thing you know meticulous is
good after um the first vintage um my
brother went to our dad and our uncle
and just said you know I really think I
can make a better wine than this
consultant you know like the opportunity
and and if there’s one word that dad
taught both of us it was the word
persistence right so Paul just wouldn’t
let this go you know said come on come
on and eventually they go all right look
you can make the the wine from the old
vnes right um he said all right call
that’s all up all I want and so the 98
of Freedom um he made that and then two
years later it was entered into the
brussa wine show and it ended up winning
the best jar in the Barosa wine show the
the trophy and um and then I think our
dad and our uncle said okay Paul you can
make all the whes from now then you get
one shot a year to make these wines so
really to understand the vigard
understand the fruit that’s coming
through you know you’ve got all this
seasonal variation to take into account
it genuinely takes years his journey of
making the freedom now you know nearly
you know over the last 28 years um that
experience is just invaluable and really
underpins you know I suppose the the the
pedigree of the wine itself so it is it
is Journey when you look at that
vertical you can not only see that sort
of wine making Evolution and uh and how
Paul has sort of adapted as he’s gone
along you know making some you know the
best wies of his life right now
obviously if there was a year that
wasn’t up to scratch he just don’t make
it you know there’s one thing about
reputation in the wine industry it’s
very hard earn and it takes decades to
build it but it doesn’t take long to
lose it so you know it’s actually
sometimes the ones that you don’t make
that help to make your reputations Lango
wants to become recognized globally as a
fine wine producer um a producer of some
of the you know the oldest Vineyards or
vnes from the oldest Vines from the
world um but also you know a steward and
a custodian not only for for us but for
the region for the BS at large true to
the region true to the community and
true to
[Music]
ourselves
hi I’m Tammy and I’m Jan you know Jan
walking through the oldest Vineyard of
the world was very emotional it’s
humbling to walk along these and among
these Ancient Vines they’re like
sculptures of history there is so much
to share from this interview that we had
at L Mill that we captured in a separate
longer version uh where you can hear
about things like the birth of the old
vne chapter in the barasa the boom and
bus cycles of the wine industry but my
favorite is about an orphan Foster
program that
saved 160-year
Vineyard yeah it’s incredible you know
and you heard it here langill is the
caretaker of what is believed the oldest
Vineyard in the world now you might be
wondering how’s that possible what about
like France and Italy or even the Middle
East and you’re right their history goes
back for thousands of years but it was
the mid 1800s when this awful pest
called fua came in and wiped out all
their Vineyards and they all had to be
replanted with resistant rootstock that
pest ultimately also came to Australia
but never quite um got to the barasa
valley and that’s why you still today
find some of these ancient Vineyards
that were planted by those first
settlers back in the mid
1800s yeah now langill is doing
something very special and and and very
beautiful they’re making this single
Vineyard chass from that oldest Vineyard
in the world and the wine is is
beautiful it’s has this dark fruit with
layers of complexity uh reflecting that
tar that that James was talking about
and these layers of soils that the roots
are tapping into but you know what
there’s more to that wine when you drink
this Rich complex wine it is like this
wine is trying to tell you the history
that the vines had to go through over
those 180 years I mean just think about
it this Vineyard was planted only 22
years after Napoleon died it was already
18 years old at the outbreak of the
American Civil War yeah crazy you know
their dad it best you are drinking
history out of the glass yes and it’s so
impactful toam I want to take a moment
and talk about the valley floor shiran
this is a blend from 30 different
Vineyards of much younger wies and it’s
a beautiful reflection of the barasa
Valley and the high quality of
everything that l mail does it gives you
a great opportunity as well to
experience the progression of the wine
from this younger Vines to the world’s
oldest vines that is richly expressed in
the freedom shurz yeah and don’t forget
about the orphan Bank Shira but you’ll
have to go to the long version to really
hear this amazing story about that wine
you as tamy said you can experience a
progression from uh from wines made from
a Vineyard of 20 to 30 years old to the
orphan Bank about 90 years old to the
freedom shash a whopping 180 year old
you can experience this all for yourself
by going to our website spoken wines.com
or just click on that link below and you
can order them right there to get them
delivered to your door yes this is
history in the glass sure is we are
spoken wies
cheers sure is well we are spoken wines
Cheers Cheers J cheers
Demi I feel
like that let’s do the cheering one more
time I’ll say gosh