Site and Climate
Ritterhalde is a named vineyard site near Gailingen on the Upper Rhine in Baden. The wine-growing region lies on Rhine slopes facing to the south. For Ritterhalde, a southern exposure and a mild local climate are described.
Soils and Grape Varieties
The vineyards of the Meersburg state winery (Staatsweingut Meersburg) in the Gailingen Ritterhalde stand on a slightly heatable, gravelly terrace of the Upper Rhine floodplain (Hochrhein-Aue). Weingut Zolg describes its vines there as growing on Ice Age moraine soils. For the site, Pinot Noir (Spätburgunder), Müller-Thurgau and Ruländer are documented.
History
The name Ritterhalde is traced back to an earlier knight’s castle that guarded the bridge over the Rhine. The Meersburg state winery established around ten hectares of vineyard area in Gailingen in 1974 and 1975; in 1976 the first Gailingen Müller-Thurgau was bottled. In the same year, a wine producer from Diessenhofen harvested the first wine from a newly planted vineyard area at the Gailingen Ritterhalde, after viticulture had not been carried out there for about 100 years.
Winemaking
Weingut Zolg documents for the wines from Ritterhalde a gentle processing of the grapes and the subsequent maturation in its own cellar.
