The sun is shining !
After a month of July dry and very hot, August was quite cold and humid. September looks very interesting and will be probably the key of this vintage; the grapes seem protected by good skins , result of the July weather.

We already received the first grapes that we buy every year and really the “table de tri” was not so useful. Concerning our own vineyards it was nice to see absolutely no rot: the grapes are healthy and we start harvest on Monday 25th.

As last years the natural level of sugar looks very good. Acidity is well-balanced and tannins are present ! The “medias” already give notice of an “outstanding vintage in white”: we can confirm with the first musts arrived in our cellar.

Kind regards,
Bernard VALLET
Pierre BOUREE Fils

As promised, here is the link to the daily update on the Domaine de la Vougeraie site. Firefox users seem to have a problem with the site, only a purple screen awaits, but Bill Gates will provide the solution if you crank-up your old internet explorer!

Super reports are coming in also from Michel Abood – aka ‘Vinotas’ – he might well be on his honeymoon, but apparently is being given a long lead! Here is his Day 1 report, and here is Day 2.

Early Saturday morning it is time to hit the road – I should be in Beaune by 9:30am. Without any real organisation I’ve suggested to a few people that we could taste a few interesting bottles in the evening – could be with just bread and cheese as we might finish grape-sorting rather late, but only one rule for the tasting – if the winemakers themselves are present, we (they) shall have to taste blind!

Cheers

The word is that there’s a lot of botrytis around – the weather has been good, but the humidity has been on the high side. Many domaines have already started in the Côte de Beaune and the rest will go full force in the Côte de Nuits at the weekend – the forecast remains good – and I expect to be joining them – there’s nothing quite like chewing on a few grapes from Chambertin while you work!

It sounds like the triage table might be important – but let’s wait and see the grapes.
Info newly in:

• Nathalie Tollot at Domaine Tollot-Beaut tells that they started their harvesting yesterday and are hoping to finish by the weekend – they are pleased with the result sofar
• Carel Voorhuis at d’Ardhuy tells me that he “started yesterday with Ladoix at a bit above 13% vol, quite ripe, with just a very little botrytis. Looking good.”
• Tomorrow Domaine de la Vougeraie will start a harvest log at their website – it already started today in French – tomorrow the translations into English begin. I’ll link to it when it’s running
• Additional info here (in French) from Patrick Essa

Cheers

So-far, so-good. The weather is not so hot (about 25˚C) but more importantly, there is plenty of sunshine. More of this, and a little breeze to counteract the humidity, and things will be just perfect – unfortunately we need about another 3 weeks of this.
Lunch with the future of British winewriting today; Neal Martin and Jamie Goode – the gossip will be flying – should be great fun!
Cheers

We move into the business-end of the year – the ripening season – after a strange growing season. There was tons and tons of rain early in the year.

June brought perfect, even flowering conditions. This, together with the earlier rain caused dense, lush foliage growth.

July made everyone think of 2003 – it was hotter than that year with record temperatures across the whole of Europe – already some were thinking that late August holidays could (again) be a mistake. It seems that the early season rain was very-much needed

August was cold and dark – double the normal amount of rain too. However advanced the vines had been in July, by the end of August we were back to the average – but only by mixing the highs and lows.

September is upon us and every year this makes the vintage – or not. It has started with clear skies and ‘okay’ temperatures (~25°C). Now is the time to watch closely!

Cheers

BBC weather forecast was a washout – literally – fortunately the days on either-side were more than passable. Get up at 8:00am and you’ll find that many have been in the vines already for almost 2 hours – they are still at it at 8:00pm – I’m happy enough to watch!
The vines were about 2-3 weeks behind the average schedule due to the cold winter, but seem to be catching up. A ton of material now to be written-up, oh and my developer is on holiday leaving a bug in the system – so at least a week before the note-finder is deployed – c’est la vie!
Cheers