Terra Sancta Mysterious Diggings Pinot Noir

A wise man once said “find the best vineyard sites you can because you can’t out perform your vineyards.” So they found the Sancta vineyard on the now world famous Felton Road in Bannockburn and set up shop.

Terra Sancta. It means sacred earth, holy land and there’s definitely something pretty bloody special about this little corner of the wine world. It’s home to the first vines planted in Bannockburn. And the firsts don’t stop there, these guys can also claim to be the first producer of a wine based Botanical Aperitivo in NZ, the first to plant the Lagrien variety, the first super premium Rosé and the first Rosé producer to make Michael Cooper’s “Super Classic” list.

Once upon a time Otago was all about rabbits and gold. The gold’s gone and the Rabbits are stew – now it’s the grapes that are worth their weight in gold (and especially Pinot Noir!) in these neck of the woods. The Mysterious Diggings label is named after those mining days of old.

This is the latest 2025 vintage and the exciting follow up to the world beating 2024 vintage which made international headlines (yet again!) by making international wine critic James Suckling’s “Top 100 Wines of the World” list. Scoring 98/100 and ranking as No.4 overall, it was the second time in three vintages this wine achieved that score. Insane!

Suckling said “I visited Terra Sancta two weeks ago in the New Zealand town of Bannockburn, Central Otago, and the vineyards – mostly ungrafted and planted in the early 1990s – were among the most beautiful I’ve ever seen, with organic and regenerative viticulture.”

The good news is the ’25 vintage is here. The bad news is production is down 60% so there’s not a not to go around!

Using Pinot Noir from their Bannockburn vineyards the guys at Terra Sancta describe this one as a “delicious, vibrant Pinot Noir” and reckon she’s all good to drink now up to 5 years from vintage.