The 2018 Valdegatiles is the most structured of the single-vineyard bottlings from 2018, a challenging year with a happy end. This was bottled at 14.3% alcohol and with a pH of 3.51, so medium ripeness and a medium to full-bodied palate with good freshness, acidity and balance, but it's still a little marked by the élevage of 18 months in second use French oak barrels. This terroir has more clay, and the wines tend to be wider and more voluptuous, with generous tannins. This needs more time in bottle. 1,343 numbered bottles produced. It was bottled in July 2020.

The 2017 Valdegatiles comes from their 1.09 hectares divided into 10 small plots in the paraje that names the wine. The wine is powerful and ripe, with structure, full-bodied and with abundant tannins. This is the single-vineyard wine that needs more time in bottle to tame its power, but it's also one of the longest lived. The oak is neatly integrated with the wine—the change to 100% used barrels was a good move. It feels a little more Mediterranean with some notes of herbs and nuts. 1,476 numbered bottles were filled in August 2019.

The most structured and powerful of the single vineyards is the 2016 Valdegatiles, where the fruit is black rather than red, but the wine keeps very good freshness. Here, the soils have more clay than in any of the other vineyards, and they are deeper and at a lower altitude on the valley floor. The vines get more water, so the wine is both more powerful but also very fresh. The tannins are fine-grained, and there's very good balance. It should develop nicely and slowly in bottle. 1,476 bottles produced. It was bottled in September 2018.

The 2014 Valdegatiles was also very impressive and followed the style I saw in these single-vineyard (or paraje) wines; it's elegant, restrained and subtle and has nicely integrated oak with contained ripeness and extraction, which makes 2014 a very elegant vintage for this collection. Like the others, it matured in second use French oak barrels, and the integration of the wood with the wine is much better. This is perhaps not as complex as Llanos del Almendro but still quite nuanced and deep. The tannins are fine, and there's a very pleasant chalky texture. 1,109 bottles were filled in June 2016.

The much cooler 2013 Valdegatiles was cropped from a rainy and unusual vintage, sourced from the same micro-plots in the Valdegatiles zone of Atauta that are planted with ancient vines at 930 meters in altitude. As with all the vines, these are biodynamically farmed, and the destemmed grapes fermented in stainless steel vats with indigenous yeasts. The élevage was in used French barriques and lasted 18 months. It's in Valdegatiles where I found more differences between 2012 and 2013, with 2013 being much riper, as the clay soils tend to stress the vines in very dry years. This 2013 shows better balance. 1,073 numbered bottles were filled in September 2015.