The '5' Has Delivered: An Early Look at the 2025 Vintage for Loire Valley Cabernet Franc
No.75 | Regional Reporting
Several meters below the surface, the mood in Bourgueil’s Caves des Perrières was a mix of exhaustion and relief. It is October 17, 2024, and with all the grapes now harvested and the fermentations percolating away in their cuves after an immensely challenging vintage, it was a moment for vignerons François Delaunay, Vincent Grégoire and Thomas Gambier to descend into the depths of the tuffeau cave to take stock of the vintage and debate where 2024 might rank against past vintages by opening some older bottles from the Domaine de la Lande cellar. As François opened bottles, we discussed vintages, good, great, challenging, and everything in between, and I couldn’t help but notice a mixed look of fatigue and optimism on Thomas Gambier’s face. “Don’t worry, Allison,” he says to me as François pours everyone a taste of the domaine’s 1993 Cuvée Préstige, also a challenging vintage, “next year is a 5, and all the 5’s are great vintages.”
As history would have it, Mother Nature has delivered …