Caladan

Caladan is one of the newer additions to winemaker Chris Carpenter's mountain portfolio within Jackson Family Wines, drawing fruit from, among others, one of the company's highest vineyards on Spring Mountain, at around 2,000 feet. As with Lokoya and Cardinale, the focus here is on expressing extreme, mountainous Napa terroirs: places where the vine has to fight for every drop of juice. Carpenter has worked for Jackson Family Wines for decades and is regarded as a specialist in mountain Cabernet. He now heads five Napa houses at once, plus Hickinbotham in Australia. Worth knowing: Caladan belongs to the same family of wines as Lokoya and Cardinale, every one of them the work of a single winemaker. Chris Carpenter has farmed nothing but mountain vineyards for more than 25 years.