San Saba Vineyards
Our heritage is Steinbeck
country
It's a gigantic history
Of heroics
Of courage
Of determination
Give us work to preserve our dignity
Our life is the cornucopia of
the land
It's determination
It's providing fine wine
First cattle, then wheat
In World War I, dried beans and sugar beets; today lettuce and
strawberries
AND
WINE GRAPES
40,000 acres of vitis vinifera
Grapes were grown in this
region for sacramental wines in the 1700's to serve the Carmel, Soledad,
San Juan Batista, and San Antonio missions.
Our climate and soil have been
described by the University of California at Davis, a nationally and
internationally recognized vitaculture and oenology school, as one of
the last great places for growing superior grapes and producing fine
wines.
San Saba Vineyards is a small
part of the story of this great valley. The vineyard, planted in 1975,
produces cabernet sauvignon, merlot, pinot noir, sauvignon blanc, and
chardonnay grapes on 70 acres. Since planting, continuous research and
experimentation with trellising, canopy management to provide more
sunlight and water reduction have been pursued to improve grape quality.
The golden rule of wine making is, "the best grapes make the best wine."
At harvest our grapes are hand
picked from carefully selected areas in the vineyard which have had
pruning and crop reduction to maximize the varietal integrity and
flavors.
San Saba is a family winery
owned by Mark and Barbara Lemmon. Mark is a retired plastic surgeon and
believes that aging makes people and wine better as long as the
fermentation is carefully monitored. Barbara has a great palate and says
life is too short not to savor quality wines.
Barbara and Mark Lemmon
with Steve McIntyre
Our name, San Saba, comes from
a mission in our home state of Texas, and our property is less than a
mile from a California mission, the Soledad mission. A vineyard is a
living thing with a personality of its own. And we treat ours as if it
were human, and in fact an outdoor intensive care unit. The doctor in my
soul is transferred to the land, the vineyard, and the winemaking.
San
Saba's time has come - a new winery to complement our old vines,
producing fine wines in limited bottlings.
In the tradition of the
Salinas Valley and Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath: we pledge
that given a chance to put in a good day's labor for you you'll get a
great product--a work of art.
|
Mark Lemmon |
Barbara Lemmon |
The framed painting of a pride
of African lions in the glaring sun of the Kalahari Desert of Botswana
is the origin of our label. The artist Rosa Bonheur was a nineteenth
century animal painter. Her most famous painting, The Horse Fair,
hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. In addition to her
many animal paintings in European museums, the Western Museum in Cody,
Wyoming has a large painting of Buffalo Bill Cody on his white horse
done by Rosa Bonheur when he took his show to Paris, France.
General Information:
sansaba@sansaba.com |
