Slightly milky medium ruby right out to the edges.  A fairly stemmy funk, cool and not well integrated blows off into new-carpet and fairly substantial oak with a little heat.  It fattens up with lots of air into something somewhat un-pinot-like.  Fairly wide and soft on entry, a good blackberry and tar kick in, acid swells and sharp, sharp tannins linger long, and the heat shows up again.

This is a pretty serious 25$ pinot, but that is about all the good I can say about it.  It is awkward in a couple places and not particularly refined in a few others and overall just a fairly typical twenty-five dollar Pinot.  I can think of a LOT of 19$ pinots it is 10x better than.  I can also think of a lot of 30$ pinots which are 10X better than THIS.  Pinot in these price-ranges tends to be fairly lineal if you pay attention to appell.  You get what you pay for.

2012 FORT ROSS Pinot Noir Sea Slopes Ft. Ross Vineyard Sonoma Coast 13.8

www.fortrossvineyard.com