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Preparing for the big ‘Kick Off’

September 5th, 2010 | Uncategorized

This will almost certainly be the last quiet weekend at home before the 2010 campaign gets under way, but even so our thoughts never stray too far from the enormous task to come. Ensuring that everything, and everybody is organised, knows their place, and knows exactly what to do – it’s all a question of detail.

For me it was time to dig around in the back of my wardrobe and drag out my old faithful ‘harvest shoes’, (complete with go-faster stripes).The shoes in question were originally purchased many years ago as football boots made especially for all-weather surfaces – as you may see they have a number of small rubber studs, designed to give a good grip on slippery surfaces.

At harvest time, the grape juice that inevitably ends up on the floor is thick and viscose, that makes it extremely slippery. By contrast, when it starts to dry, its properties change completely and it becomes more like glue, horribly sticky and finding its way into every small corner of the bodega on the bottom of your feet.

Quite naturally, strong and appropriate footwear is essential at all times in the cellar (as the health and safety guys would tell you), but my experience in recent years always leads me back to the same old harvest shoes. Heaven only knows what I will do when they are eventually forced to retire!

First cases of 2010

September 3rd, 2010 | Uncategorized

My photo, taken only this morning, shows the first cases being delivered to a vineyard site, in anticipation of the 2010 vintage.

For the last week or so Angela has been busy in her hovel  laboratory analysing grape samples from different locations – it would appear from her analysis that some of the southern most vineyards might be picked as early as next week. Time and weather will determine exactly when….

After a long, dry summer our focus on the weather forecast becomes more intense – some weather sites are predicting rain at the beginning of next week, but with a return to fine weather by the end of the week. If this is correct, and the rain is not too heavy, then this will serve to clean the fruit, which may actually be a little dusty after the prolonged dry spell.

No ifs, no butts….. please

September 2nd, 2010 | Uncategorized
A pretty disgusting picture, which to be honest, turns my stomach – I have never smoked in my life, nor do I ever wish to. Thankfully I have never understood the need.
So why have I turned to cigarettes today? Well, actually, I haven’t, but our local government and police have, and believe it or not it is related to the weather. Having experienced virtually zero rainfall for the last two or three months, it is not only our vineyards that are dry, but it is also our local forests and vegetation that are suffering too. This of course equates to an acute fire risk, such as those we experienced in 2006. Indeed, only about 60 or 70 kilometers south of here, just across the Miño river in Northern Portugal, severe forest fires have now been raging for some time.
Therefore, one of the precautions taken by the authorities is to remind motorists, using the matrix signs on our motorways, that disgarding cigarette butts (or is it cigarette ends?) from your car window can lead to a penalty of four points on your driving licence if you are caught – and in this case points do not lead to prizes!

Following on with my drought theme, if you look carefully at this photo you might think that the lady in the white uniform is watering some plants….. not so, she is washing the ground. This is a daily ritual, come rain or shine, whereby two ladies with hosepipes spend about half an hour washing the entrance and pavement area outside a local hotel (which I will not name simply because this is not the point of my story). There does not appear to be any such thing as a ‘hosepipe ban’ over here in Spain, and in this way the Spanish appear to be neither considerate nor concerned when it comes to the waste of water.

It was only a day or two ago that Angela’s uncle Fernando (a local plumber), was telling us that his most frequent call-out at the moment is from consumers who rely on underground wells to draw their water….. the wells are starting to dry up, and so we have to assume that the situation must be pretty serious in some places.

Just as a footnote, I have always rather suspected that the Spanish may suffer a little from what I call “escobaphobia” – a morbid fear of brushes or brushing. The reason I say this is that if they see a few leaves or a bit of dirt on the ground, their automatic reaction is to reach for the hosepipe rather than simply taking out a brush – as I mentioned before , a serious mis-use of water in my opinion.

Last minute chores

September 1st, 2010 | Uncategorized

With only a week or two to go now we continue with our programme of pre-harvest chores – sometimes catching up with a few of the jobs you have been planning to do, but never quite got around too. One such job is laying a bit of concrete……

There’s actually something quite satisfying about putting down concrete, adding a new part to the building and its surroundings that will hopefully be around for years to come. This time we have made a small improvement to the entrance of our grape reception, making it just a shade easier for the grape-laiden vehicles to enter during the coming weeks.

As you may notice, our fashion conscious vineyard manager David is modelling this autumn’s latest uniform, incorporating some rather fetching 3/4 length pants, revealing just a modest amount of bare ankle (either that of he is growing rather too quickly for his age). Actually, the truth is probably more to do with the prolonged period of baking weather that we have been experiencing over the last couple of months – it’s hot work out in the finca!

The harvest looms in very dry conditions

August 30th, 2010 | Uncategorized

Galicia remains one of the driest places in Spain at the moment, and despite our prayers we have only enjoyed one day of light rain in the last couple of months. As I write this post the temperature remains up around 30°C (86°F), and whilst we normally require a good deal of sunshine during the growing season, in 2010 it has simply been a bit excessive.

With our vines showing signs of stress, it now looks like we might start to pick around the middle of September, rather than at the end of the month as we had originally anticipated (you may recall that we had a fairly late flowering). Some other denominations in the south of Galicia are predicting a start date as early as the 6th September.

One of the few upsides of a summer without rain has been the reduced number of treatments required in the vineyard, obviously the dry conditions have not been supportive to diseases such as mildew, and as a result there has been little or no intervention needed.

This week we embark on a major cleaning programme in the bodega as all the equipment used only once a year at harvest time, needs a good scrub down in preparation for the big ‘kick-off’.

Galicia goes bilingual

August 25th, 2010 | Uncategorized

Here in Galicia it is quite normal to see our matrix motorway signs in two languages, but usually they would be alternating between Spanish and Galician.

Yesterday, for the first time since I arrived here in Galicia I noticed an overhead gantry, not only written in English, but with a very polite request too – “Respect speed limits please”. I can’t ever remember seeing a sign in England saying please, it would probably be more likely to say “Respect speed limits or else hand over your cash!”

Although we are still in August (technically the peak of the holiday season), we still do not welcome too many British visitors to our remote corner of Spain, which is really what makes this latest development so unexpected.

Perhaps as this sign is on my daily route between the Bodega and our home, it has been introduced purely for my benefit – not that you would ever find me speeding, honestly officer…..

We’re back!

August 23rd, 2010 | Uncategorized

OK, so I acknowledge that I am the ‘king of corny jokes’, and probably leave many people wincing when they discover my twisted sense of humour for the first time, but I can assure you that my story this morning was not in any way staged or planned in advance……

I always intended to write something witty about our return to work with ‘batteries fully charged’ and ready for the forthcoming harvest, but then one of my batteries went and died on me!

It seems like my car (that I had barely used last week) decided to take an extended break, and so my eagerness to get back to work was curtailed slightly when my engine failed to start this morning. Fortunately I have a set of jump leads and was able to make my way to the Bodega with only the minimum of delay. Suffice to say that my car is now charging, albeit that I had to dismantle half of the boot (trunk) to get to the battery.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, we still have a little bottling and labelling to finish before we start on the pre-harvest deep clean, and the other news is that today we have our first real rain for several weeks. We have had a little ‘mizzle’ in the last day or two, but today we are enjoying a good shower of rain. One or two days of gentle rain at this point will not go amiss, as this will only benefit the vines that have been suffering during the extended hot period – a return to fine weather in a couple of days would then be perfect……

We have our fingers crossed.

Steam power – the green option?

August 17th, 2010 | Uncategorized
Without too much to do except wait for the grapes to ripen in the vineyards we decided to have a clear out in one of the buildings at the back of the Bodega.
Hidden in a corner we discovered an old pump, which had probably been earmarked for the scrapyard – but we have since decided to give it a new lease of life….

At the front of the bodega we used to have a couple of old barrels, intended purely as a bit of decoration. Unfortunately, the ravages of the Galician weather have taken their toll on the wood, and eventually they simply started to fall apart. It was my original intention just to prepare a couple of replacements, but then we came across this old engine which seemed like a much more attractive and permanent solution.

A couple of coats of paint later it has now been installed in its new home immediately adjacent to our front door, not exactly restored to its former glory, but looking rather resplendent nonetheless.

I have to confess that as the front area of our bodega is open to the road, we have taken the precaution of bolting and welding this new addition to a rather large piece of concrete!

Is there anybody out there?

August 13th, 2010 | Uncategorized
The annual Microsoft Office outing! 

Yesterday my e-mail was so quiet I almost contacted my provider to see if my connection was working properly – I got so desperate that I was almost praying for junk mail!

We must have reached one of the peak holiday weeks, when we receive more out-of-office replies than we do answers.

Please don’t forget that it’s our turn next week, and that the Bodega will be closed for one week. I’m so excited I’ve already packed my bucket and spade!

Have a great holiday wherever you are……

Autumn Leaves

August 10th, 2010 | Uncategorized

If you look at today’s photo, you might have a bit of a problem working it out – the reason is that I have deliberately loaded it upside-down!

It just stuck me when I took this snap, that there were almost as many leaves on the ground as there were on the pergolas overhead. The reason? Well, we believe quite simply that quality is created in the vineyard, and so during the summer months we spend a lot of time working on the canopy, making sure that our fruit gets the best possible exposure. Not only that, but we have also done some ‘green harvesting’ this year, which, as I’m sure you know, means removing any excess bunches from the vine before they mature. Of course this simply has the effect of concentrating all the efforts of the plant into the optimum number of bunches.

The hot weather continues, there is no rain on the horizon, and the harvest looms ever closer.

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