96 La Fleur-Petrus

1996 Chateau La Fleur-Petrus;
Ruby with garnet rim. Greenish note, paprika, blackcurrants, herbal and spices, very elegant, touch of liquorice. Balanced and good acidity, ripe tannins, slightly hollow still, but really starting to shape up, needs time, even if it starts to charm, and a long length.87

First time I tried this, around 01-02, it was so firm and green and tannic, it was just too much. I remember the day so well, I was on the other side of the Oslo fjord, in a warm June day, and I was a passenger of a stunning, bright red Jaguar E-type Series one roadster, one of the first ones, with a 3,8 litre engine, with the bottle in my lap, on the way to a sea-front barbeque. The Jaguar was a perfect car on this day, looking over the bonnet, seeing how the fresh and green oaks and beech and pines mirrored themselves as fleeting glimpses of memories as they rushed over the bonnet of this fast aproaching classicThen the wine, after all this excitement and expectations didn't deliver, at all. It was too brutal, too young, and I was the only fool to blame, I know that now.

Also, another, much more sad chapter is now linked to this memory. The host of this same barbeque, Architect Nils Vosgraff, passed away this last Christmas in a car crash, possibly in one of his bellowed Jaguars. May you rest in pease.