Work in the vineyard is now complete – between now and the harvest (in about four or five weeks time) there is almost nothing more that we can do. Nature will run its course until the time that we pick. In this way our attention now turns to the preparation of the bodega, not only scrubbing the tanks inside and out, but making sure that every wall, every floor and every piece of equipment is as clean as it can be.

In a way, preparation in our tank room has been underway for months. The movement of every wine is calculated and choreographed to ensure that, not only is the wine moved as little as possible (to avoid potential oxidation), but also that it ends up in the right place, as we systematically vacate tanks in the areas designated for the arrival of this year’s new grape must.

Over the last few days, the deep cleaning process has begun, albeit that later this week we will be closing the bodega for a short 10 day break. This will be the last opportunity for our team to rest their bones, and weather permitting, take a bit of sun, before our 2019 campaign gets underway. Of course, there will still be a huge amount of preparation work to undertake when we re-open but at least we have made a start.

In today’s picture you can see our tanks gleaming, almost ‘Van Gogh stylie’…… (thanks PhotoShop!)