2002 Leoville Barton

I thought the '02 Barton was a nice wine, though a bit stern, I'm putting mine away for a long sleep. The '03 is a much more fleshy wine, that got big scores from WA & WS (98 in case of latter, I believe).

Dollar was stronger when '02 campaign started, volume was higher, critcial buzz was lower. I paid about $30 on futures for '02, $44 for '03. High scores for '03 drove prices up, now more like $150

$54 seems stiff for '02, plenty of places have for $40-45. If you pay sales tax on local purchases, shipping would be less than tax for a few bottles. ' HTH,Dale

snipped-for-privacy@san.rr.com wrote:

"DaleW" wrote in news:1167256783.198022.240910@

I paid 35 euros for the 2002 when a local retailer offered a promotion, 51 euros for the 2001 and 42 euros for the 2003 at a big spanish chain of department stores. The 2003 seems to be the best deal of all, though I have gone through three bottles of the 2001 and it was drinking so well one year ago.

My very limited experience with Leoville Barton says that it always needs time. When in great vintages, luscious fruit allows to drink young (in fact, many spanish wanna-be wines have stronger tannins than Leoville Barton 2001) even if there is a tannic structure.

S.

At Garagiste's 2002 Bdx tasting in July '05, the Leoville Barton was voted 6th best overall of the 16 wines we tasted. That's not a bad showing for a vintage that was less than heralded. The overall top five were:

1. Pape Clement
2. Mouton Rothschild
3. Latour
4. Osoyoos-Larose (a ringer from BC)
5. Palmer

My abbreviated notes from that tasting for the Barton say, "very light nose, no oak, closed, not much flavor, tannic."

My top five were:

1. Mouton
2. Lynch Bages
3. Pichon Lalande
4. Pape Clement
5. Cheval Blanc, in a virtual tie with the Osoyoos-Larose

I bought Mouton and Osoyoos-Larose. Osoyoos has held steady around $30-35 the last couple vintages, but the '03's have gotten too pricey for me.

JJ

JJ