Pinot Noir is the Holy Grail of the wine world.

What grape variety could make two otherwise rational and successful vintners leave the security of Napa Valley, the USA's greatest Cabernet Sauvignon producing region, for the back roads of Oregon? Pinot Noir, of course, and the challenge ofrealising its elusive and largely unfulf5lled potential in North America. In 1988 Stephen Girard ( Girard Winery ) and Carl Doumani ( Stag Leap's Winery ) acquired a 2,000 acre parcel of land between Benton and Lane counties in the southern part of Oregon's Willamette Valley. Why here? "It's the only place where all the right elements - soils, sun hours, temperature and elevation - come together to make an ideal site for Pinot Noir." It's also encouraging that the original name of the property was Sunnymount Ranch because, more often than not, the mountains here leave a hole in the Oregon clouds to let the sunshine through.