Rippon — Attraction in South Island

Unfortunately I didn’t even get a chance to try the wine. My family and I are visiting Wanaka and I’m literally sitting in the winery parking lot writing this review. I hardly write them even if it’s a bad experience but this was a particularly frustrating experience. I was checking out the grounds and walked around the side to take a picture of the vineyard overlooking the water. I’m assuming an employee was sitting on the side smoking and i smiled and said hello. She said hello and that was that. However, in the small container outside a lady rudely came out and immediately became very rude with me. She asked me what I was doing there and that I needed to not be anywhere near the area again. Additionally she said I need to go “way over there” and not to come back. She said there was a private event going on but the interesting thing was there were no signs other than a tiny one I actually went and sought out. The wedding had not started and people had just showed up. Had there been signs, of course I wouldn’t have ventured over there but it was literally not evident. I am still shocked at how rude this person was to me for no reason. So my family and I decided it was best to leave. If this is a representation of the service provided, I wouldn’t recommend this place to visit. There are plenty of places where the common theme is kindness and friendless by the locals. This isn’t...

This is a beautiful place that I guess every Wanaka visitor will end up checking it out anyway. The location is on the hill overlooking the lake. It claims to be the 'most photographed vinyard in the world', which I don't want to argue - it does have spectacular view especially when the day is nice.

however to my taste, their wine is rather ordinary and over priced. They claim all the wine making specifics which I am not sure how much sense it is making... they brag that don't irrigate their vines, how does this improve the fruit or the wine? or just leaving the fruit quality to the random? the staff claimed that they used the yeast 'from the plant' not using wine maker yeast, is this a taste driven decision or just a marketing term?

They don't have a big production given the size of their vineyard and I am sure Rippon will sell everything at cellar door at the premium. I am sure many will enjoy the view while appreciating the wine and cheese plate in a sunny afternoon there. Unfortunately to me the wine there fails into average quality range. I will go there for a nice bunch of lake photos and keep look for my wines...

The views from the winery are truly incredible. The free wine tasting was also very good (but helped significantly because it was free).

We felt quite rushed during the session as it's only half an hour. The wine portion sizes were very small, and the wine price list was pushed on us quite a bit at the end with the expectation that you would buy a bottle.

Now, all of the issues above seem small, but this is only because the tasting was free. We'd have much preferred to pay some money ($10 to $30) for a longer session, additional tasting note information, more wine and less expectations of purchase.

The whole 'free wine tasting to guilt you into purchase' wasn't great. I don't expect this being the intention from the owners, but that was how it felt.

I think the access should be improved for walking/cycling visitors, and some food options would be great. Also the opportunity to have people enjoy the beautiful scenery with a glass of wine afterwards. Someone in our group asked this and then get told no 'because of the liquor licence', which seemed odd.

Some small improvements would...