As we roll into day 5 I think it is safe to say that we are well past the mid-point of this years harvest. With around 40 pickers in our vineyards our presses are well supplied, and have no break at all between unloading and re-filling (well, they do only work once a year).

The racking of the clean ‘must’ is well under way, and so far the cooling system is behaving itself. Indeed, it is proving so effective that it can apparently chill the odd can of Coke! The zig-zag arrangement of pipes in the photo are known as a heat exchanger – this is a length of pipe surrounded by an outer cooling jacket through which the grape juice passes immediately after pressing. Obviously, because the exchanger is icy cold this has the effect of cooling the must very rapidly even before it reaches the temperature controlled tanks – it is just a slightly more effective way to drop the temperature quickly.

I think that’s what they call product placement (using our heat exchanger)

As I mentioned a little earlier, I am the one who treads the 39 steps more than most, often rushing samples from the grape reception down to the laboratory two floors below (I lost 2kg in the first 3 days!). From what Angela has seen so far, she is pretty happy with her analysis, and it looks like it will not be necessary to make any adjustments to the acidity this year – we shall see…..