Got home finally about midday Tuesday UK time having left my Dover Premier Travel Inn around 5 a.m. Arrived there early last evening tres fatigue from the Calais time 4.10 p.m. ferry which I made by dint of getting my foot down more than I’d have liked and no stop for lunch having left Nuits at around 9 a.m. I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed, or felt I needed, a bath so much in my life !!!
Pre my Cote departure and in a dark, rainly, back street Nuits butcher’s I did a double take & saw Etienne Grivot at the counter buying his meat !! Popped into the shop & introduced myself having only met him briefly at London January en primeur tastings before from which I’m sure he wont have remembered me – he must have thought ‘who the hell is this crazy Englishman’ ? He cautiously advised his vendange had been good.
Am cream crackered like never before after this vendange – it was sooo tough.
I’ve unpacked and am about to download my photos. Will try and write up a limited diary as I’ve hardly any notes and a dodgy memory but hope to add some amusements. Think this was my best drinking vendange of my 4 – we drank some nifty stuff – mine, Dubreuil-Fontaine’s and Arlauds. I attended the full Arlaud paulee this year, camera kept intact, cracking ‘do’, much fun had by all with dancing to circa 3 a.m from an 8.30 evening start but boy, oh boy, oh boy did I have a mal de (du ?) tete the following day and when Alex Gambal made me a thick dark black coffee it was all I could do to keep it down !!!
We finished Saturday lunchtime in a plot of Bourgogne Rouge below the ’74 between Morey and Chambolle – more like below Chambolle. Finishing Saturday meant my free day being a Sunday was less than ideal but I got in a visit to the aforementioned AG [ thought I’d better get some of that 2008 Bourgogne Blanc Bill raves about], from where I called into see Ray Walker (nice guy, lovely rented cellar, and wines being made in garagiste style !), and then spent the afternoon wandering Morey to Gevrey and familiarising myself with the Gevrey vineyards (or some of them) which I’ve never done along with photos.
You were right about Ponsot – I talked to what seemed their vineyard organiser (balding guy) on the Sunday afternoon when they were in what I think was Latricieres, no, must have been Chapelle from looking at Coates, and visualising were they were along from Clos St Denis / Clos de la Roche on the opposite down side of the road. They were out there again, or similar, on the increasingly wet Monday first thing as I drove away, with below them someone else – possibly Faiveley – as the only two outfits to have left things so late.
Only had a quick squint at Bill’s diary entries so far but reckon I’m happy to agree, meaning from my own free thoughts before / without being influenced by that (!) – reds wise CdN think this could be pretty good. Certainly Cyprien and Romain Arlaud are pretty happy to say the least.
More to follow including a reference to Raquel Welch (Welsh ?) – tres bizarre !
Mark de Morey
