Description

This wonderful 2021 first flush comes from the beautiful and unique tea garden, Jungpana Upper. What makes Jungpana unique is its location. To get to the entrance of the Estate you first need to drive down a very bumpy unpaved road which ends at a stream. From there, to get to the factory, you need to climb up 660 of steep steps cut into the hillside. Everything that enters and exits the tea garden has to come up or down those steps; seeing the workers skipping down the very uneven and steep steps at speed with a tea chest on their backs is quite a sight.

This unique location makes Jungpana an island of tea in a sea of forests. It is a completely natural environment with a unique micro-climate and the air is filled with chatter of tea pickers against a background of birdsong.

Emblematic of the garden it comes from, this is a unique first flush tea.

Only expert tea pickers who are trained to pick the very youngest two leaves and a bud are allowed to pluck leaves for Jungpana’s top teas.  Taken from pure china bush and the clonal (cultivated) plant Phoobsering 312 growing at an altitude of 1250 meters, the small, succulent leaves used to make this tea were plucked in small amounts over several days after some much needed rain – from the 27. March to 1. April. The delicate green leaves and silver tips brew to a beautiful pale amber liquor. The infusion is wonderfully aromatic and flavoursome, with a unique combination of rose and lingering spring muscatel and absolutely no astringency.