Three bottles of 1997 Chalk Hill Estate bottled Merlot.   After harvesting the wine by hand, the Merlot grapes were vinified using traditional techniques. Fermentation occurred with only natural yeasts, followed by twenty months in French oak barrels, half of it new. Quarterly racking enabled us to bottle the wine without fining or filtering, to best preserve the character of the wine. The 1997 displays flavors of ripe raspberries and blueberries with a dusting of lavender and earthy spiciness.