Autumn is the time to drink this wine.

2016 Alain Voge Les Bulles D'Alain.
100% Marsanne, traditional method brut nature. Disgorged 2022.
Honey-gold colour with a bit of pale green at the centre.
Good, consistent bead.
It has an interesting nose, starting with quince and then moving through grilled oranges with autumn leaves, some beeswax and, finally, a hint of copper penny. Slight oxidation?
On the palate, it is a nicely structured, mid-scale wine, balanced between dried apricots and leaves with a bit of citrus.
The copper penny comes back a bit on the pleasantly long finish.
Autumn is the perfect time to drink this wine.
My only bottle.
If I could find more, I would buy it.

[Jenise]

Bob, I had four of these and I served the last one last month at a blind tasting in Bellingham for non-champagne bubbles. No oxidation present in my bottle. I didn't take notes but your quince, grilled oranges and beeswax ring a bell, though it also sounds like your bottle was a bit further along than mine--it happens. The Dorks were very impressed--not often you can open something THAT good wherein it turns out to be just bout the last grape a bunch of afficionados would ever guess from just about the last location anyone would ever suspect. Who else has had a sparkling white from the Northern Rhone before? Not I!

Btw, I think Bill is interested in rounding up some more (probably a more recent vintage).

Newer vintages haven't come in to my source but I can hook you two up with 3 bb each of the 2016 if you like. Or you can arm wrestle for all 6......

I gave a bottle of this to Nadine, the winemaker at Terravista recently, as they have a small plot of Marsanne, and told her that I thought there could well be a demand for a small amount of premium sparkling Marsanne (just like they had syrah ;'experimentally' for several years and sold it only to the faithful - including yours truly). They opened that up recently - I think Jenise got some, but it is still primarily a wine that goes to a regular buying list of people.

I really like this wine and not just because it is a rarity. Great wine to pop at blind tastings - no one expects the Spanish inquisition....I mean Marsanne.

Bill, I was pretty sure this wine had come through you.
The oxidative note was in the background so it added complexity for me.
I'd go for some of a newer vintage for sure.