Friday 11th September – Well, the good news today is that the sun was shining from the moment that it appeared over the horizon, but the question, as always was, how long would it last? The only thing we can do in these circumstances is to “make hay while the sun shines” and pick as much fruit as we can.

The first part of the day was not quite as ‘fluid’ (if you’ll pardon the pun) as the previous day had been, and somehow seemed a bit more disjointed – just not quite as smooth. However, by lunch we had already made a couple of pressings, and the pace and fluidity started to pick up from there. By early evening we had grapes arriving by the lorry load, and the presses were struggling to keep up with the flow, or perhaps I should say cascade. Our bodega team was working as hard as they could, but there was a brief moment, mid-evening, when we had to make suppliers wait to unload their vehicles – the reception was pretty much full to capacity.

By 10 or 11pm order had been restored, and all that remained was to clear the backlog of pressings – there was no doubt that this was going to a a long night…. and for good reason. If yesterday had been a record day for volume, then I was amazed to calculate that yesterday’s record had been smashed by as much as 20%! Fran and his team who work on the presses, will certainly deserve a good night’s sleep when they finish (or should that be day’s sleep?)Friday 11th September – Well, the good news today is that the sun was shining from the moment that it appeared over the horizon, but the question, as always was, how long would it last? The only thing we can do in these circumstances is to “make hay while the sun shines” and pick as much fruit as we can.

The first part of the day was not quite as ‘fluid’ (if you’ll pardon the pun) as the previous day had been, and somehow seemed a bit more disjointed – just not quite as smooth. However, by lunch we had already made a couple of pressings, and the pace and fluidity started to pick up from there. By early evening we had grapes arriving by the lorry load, and the presses were struggling to keep up with the flow, or perhaps I should say cascade. Our bodega team was working as hard as they could, but there was a brief moment, mid-evening, when we had to make suppliers wait to unload their vehicles – the reception was pretty much full to capacity.

By 10 or 11pm order had been restored, and all that remained was to clear the backlog of pressings – there was no doubt that this was going to a a long night…. and for good reason. If yesterday had been a record day for volume, then I was amazed to calculate that yesterday’s record had been smashed by as much as 20%! Fran and his team who work on the presses, will certainly deserve a good night’s sleep when they finish (or should that be day’s sleep?)