The time is nigh – I’ll be at the triage table from tomorrow for five days.

Despite the early predictions of mid-August harvesting and the hot weather of the last couple of weeks, many will not start their picking until the calendar turns to September. There’s a big difference between Côte de Beaune and Côte de Nuits ripeness this year, in fact the ripeness border is sitting somewhere around Beaune just now. I know a number of estates that started to take in some CdB Bourgogne Rouge and parcels of villages whites (Meursault for instance) at the weekend; the first premier crus of Nicolas Rossignol (Volnay Les Angles) were harvested yesterday. Yet as contributors to the forum note, many (though not all) vines in Savigny need the best part of a week longer and so it goes as you head north.

The photos above are this year’s Meursault, Volnay and ladybirds – I’ll be watching out for those little blighters!

Vintage news. More tomorrow…

Just back from two days in the Côtes; almost certainly my last two before the harvest.

Tuesday started with a sultry 32°C heat – but the clouds were gathering, and so was the concern – the Côte d’Or was on ‘amber-alert’ for storms and that included hail, usually there’s not so much warning…

The vines looked in rude health – there is a little grillage as shown in my last ‘vintage 2011’ post, and it can be as much as twenty percent in some isolated parcels, but as one vigneron told me with a smile “that saves a green harvest! ” There were just one or two areas in the Côte de Beaune where there was some veraison (the green grapes starting to turn red), mainly in the young vines, but I didn’t find any in the Côte de Nuits. The vines are also very clean – no rot or fungus to be seen – though warm weather and plenty of rain can see an outbreak develop in about 10 days for insufficiently treated vines. Actually, while I was there a number of vignerons were completing what they described as their last treatments of the year; certain of those treatments cannot be made within thirty days of the harvest… At lunch I met Arnaud Orsel of the Confrérie Chevaliers du Tastevin; they had just decided where the ‘Saint Vincent’ would be held in 2012, and it was a surprise! Pushing the Unesco world heritage sites angle, they decided they would have the St.Vincent in not just one place, but three; Dijon, Nuits and Beaune – it sounds like a lot of walking to me 😉

As Tuesday wore-on the cloud became thicker and the odd rumble of thunder was an accompaniment. Those not treating their vines seemed to be bottling; mainly generic 2010s but also some later 2009s. Plenty of rain in the early evening, lightening too, but no hail. This continued the whole night with a show of spectacular thunder and lightening. Morey St.Denis received 14mm of rain – that was probably about average.

Wednesday we found out that not everyone escaped; the Saone plain to the east had plenty of hail – half golf-ball size – and some of that crept into Santenay too. I’ve still no info how bad that was, but everywhere else escaped. It was much cooler, about 18°C, raining incessantly if not particularly heavily.

Although in the last years we have seen harvests in the Côte de Beaune and Côte de Nuits often happening at the same time, the Côte de Beaune domaines are looking to start anywhere between the 20-25th August but the Côte de Nuits are typically looking at the 29th August onwards. A few more cloudy days at 18°C and they might add another two or three days to that – let’s see…

For info I didn’t just visit a bunch of old haunts, there were also two new domaines; Digioia-Royer (just say ‘de-joy-a’ and you are close enough) in Chambolle and Henri Jouan in Morey, good wines but infos on those will be in the Autumn issue.

Still travelling so not much in the way of wine drunk around here – tsk!

‘The boss‘ at my home domaine was joking yesterday that (having just taken a tour through the vines of Volnay) rather than triaging when I arrive on the 29th of August, I could be doing the ‘decuvage‘ instead – i.e. after fermenting, the shovelling out of the spent grapes from the fermentation tanks for pressing…!

One or two domaines are thinking of bringing forward by a day or two their first harvests in the Côte de Beaune – say to the 20th August!

Whilst we have so-far avoided any major issues surrounding rot or drought stress, as you can see from the picture (taken yesterday) some isolated vines got an overwhelming heat stress on June 27/28th. Those small grapes not protected from the full sun by the canopy were literally grilled – locally ‘grillage’…

In the great scheme of things it matters not a jot, but just for the record the sunshine has this week brought about the first instances of bud-break in the Côte d’Or.

The forecast remains good (double-good as I’ll be there for a long weekend!) but we are two weeks ahead of the average so a wary eye will be kept on the forecast; nobody wants frost, and normally people don’t breath easily until May!

Jumping ahead of myself but ‘inspired’ by Bill’s recent excellent photos, here’s 3 taken on the morning of taking my sad leave of Morey-St-Denis. Taken over the wall from Arlaud’s entrance for the first 2, and from the wall at the top of the car park for the bar/boulangerie, these were taken about 7.30 a.m. as the sun came up over the eastern horizon. The orange glow infused the walls of the village in a lovely way.

Enjoy !

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

An update from the home team

Chambertin was harvested late on Friday 1st and Charmes-Chambertin on the 2nd October. Those grapes continued along the theme of healthy millerandes, and even a ‘positive selection’ of 10% whole clusters was used for the Charmes.

The fermentations have, so far, been really slow. One Volnay cuvée and the Ladoix cuvée have almost finished their fermentations, the others are being roused by some gentle warming of the tanks.

The only concern right now is that some of the tannins seem to have an aggressive edge to them – but they are expected to improve as the maceration continues but care will need to be taken with the extractions.

Still waiting for pics – no pics, no toilet seat 😉

What is in tank looks good, potentially even great. The only cloud is the quantity. Yields are tiny. 25hl/ha in the Morey red. Ouch.
Jeremy Seysses