A great crop – of cut flowers – in Fixin…
Except for the cars, a little Côte de Nuits action from this morning:
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a great crop in fixin – of cut flowers…
Travels in Burgundy 2014
côtes de nuits yesterday…
I simply love this line, arcade, procession, avenue of trees on the Quai Dumorey in Nuits St.Georges. I guess I’m lucky I don’t have such ‘cherry-picker’ equipment at home – otherwise I’d spend my life pruning and then lying back, thinking I’d missed a bit:
Just to show that even the most hideously expensive domaines don’t always get the quantity of spray just right – no-matter how green, bio, biodynamic, Demeter they may be! Madame B-L’s Richebourg:
Also, just to show that not everyone is suffering with yields! – Again in Richebourg:
back in old beaune town…
Back in old Beaune town – it seems like ages I was away – hmm – 8 days!
The road to Beaune was shared yesterday evening with the service vehicles of the Tour de France – at least as far as Besançon. They were all much faster than me – even with a dozen bicycles on their roofs – I suppose somebody has to observe the speed limits 😉
Here in the Côte d’Or the first half of July has been wetter and cooler, virtually since the big storm of the 28th, but this morning we’re already in the mid 20°s at 09h00 and the forecast is for 30°+ by Thursday. It’s a beautiful blue sky too.
On this post-Bastille Day I think I’ll ease myself in with a coffee on the place Carnot and then formulate my plan of whom to annoy!
muggy, warm chassagne…
First visit in Chassagne-Montrachet this morning, 09h00.
Overnight there’s been a little rain – dirty rain – my car is filthy. It’s muggy and warm and storms are once-more forecast – many, many fingers are crossed!
A short tour of the vines shows that Chassagne was very lucky last weekend – very little of the potential crop was spoiled by the hail – probably no more than 5%. Their fingers remain firmly crossed, remembering that they lost almost 70% in 2012 to hail and other maladies…
Chassagne, today:
i can see you…!
Spotted – or rather first heard! – in Meursault Perrières today.
I’ve been touring the vines – some in reasonable condition, some are very sad – pockets of vines in Pommard and Beaune seem particularly hard hit, some have more grapes left than leaves! It’s early enough (the hail) that split and damaged grapes will have plenty of time to dry out and drop off, but the rest will need new leaves to do the necessary photosynthesis…
Plus a few views from this morning:
sober, sombre reflection…
To take stock, it’s always better to take a step back – emotions can be raw in the first minutes / hours after such an attack.
My experience of the hail on Saturday was in the Place Carnot in Beaune. It started at 17h10 with heavy rain – then for 3-4 minutes there was hail too – big enough pellets to hurt, but modestly sized – say 1+cm in diameter. Of-course, it turned-out that was only the first wave. Fifteen minutes later it hit again, but this time the first notice was the hail, not rain, and this time the projectiles were the size of a 2 Euro coin – they can also damage your body as you can see below – the clusters on many vines had no chance.
It was a broad and prolonged attack – this year from Chagny all the way to Gevrey-Chambertin – but, once-more, it was that area from Meursault to Savigny that was most cruelly affected. The much vaunted ‘hail defence’ system was lit in Volnay 3 hours prior to the well-forecast storm-front, it was no defence in this case. To-date, the Mâconnais, Chalonnaise and Chablis rest largely untouched.
I received the following email from a grower, in Volnay, yesterday evening:
I found my email written July 23, 2013: Today, I can make a “copy and paste” because yesterday, June 28 2014, was once-more devastated by hail:
Just a little word of collective thanks for all the many people who bring us comfort by email or phone. And yes, this is the shit, we were again hit by hail on Saturday 28 June at 17:00. The most damaged vines are those of Pommard: Epenots, Rugiens, Clos Micault between 50 and 80%, Pézerolles 80-100%. In Volnay we are damaged between 40 and 80% – that’s my current estimate.
It is hard to take because we had this situation in 2001, 2004, 2012 and 2013. It is all the more disheartening because we had worked well, the vines were beautiful and indicated a normal harvest. All the green work was completed and the team was ready for the holidays.
We will reign-in all investments and business travel – everything that is not strictly necessary for our Domaine. As I am “an old fart” (a joke between my dad and me), I have no debt to repay or more cumbersome investments. So the goal is to preserve the financial equilibrium of the operation and eventually the dynamism.
Thank you all for your moral support and the awareness that we are surrounded by family, friends and clients.
Indeed, until the weather-front made its attack, the vines and clusters looked picture-perfect. Some growers were openly opining on the maximum that they would be allowed to declare at harvest – roughly 50 hl/ha for villages – very few will now need to make the calculations. The southern part of the Côte de Beaune was a little less damaged, likewise the Côte de Nuits – but there were also hailstones of 2-4cm diameter in Vosne-Romanée – the Clos de Vougeot and Romanée St.Vivant lost up to 25%, maybe more in Echézeaux. Much of the rest of Vosne lost more like 15%. We also shouldn’t forget; the hail hit in June, July AND August in 2012…
Three hours after the hail hit, was the ‘Elegance de Volnay’ dinner and celebration of the appellation. It began in subdued fashion, but in the end, the vignerons began pouring their bottles saying “Drink now – we might not have any wine in a couple of years…”
Another view from Scott Paul and Amanda Regan.
With thanks to Thomas Bouley, Vincent Latour, Anne Parent and Nicolas Rossignol for the following images:
Saturday morning…
Hail Defence?
how far are you going?
Santiago de Compostela.
Beaune still really is the crossroads of Europe it seems. In the hotel today I met a couple who were clearly on a walking tour – today they were walking ~4 hours to Chagny. But actually their final destination was a good deal further away – the Santiago de Compostela – in Spain!
Oh, and that’s not the closest part of Spain either!
Historically, Beaune was an important stopping-off point in many a pilgrimage and it seems that for some people, little has changed. The owner of my hotel has a special stamp for these people’s notebooks/routebooks to register that they were in Beaune. People start from as far away as Bonn or Strasbourg, she says. But normally they don’t do it in a single journey – they often choose to do three weeks per year, re-starting where they left-off the previous year. She did mention one man who left Beaune and was back 6 months later – he had been there and back in that time – but he still had a long way to go, in order to get home!
weekend wine / monday weather
Some lovely wines at the weekend. Collet’s (Chablis) first vintage of Crémant is super and for a mere €8.40 from the domaine too! Gambal’s Dents du Chien is, you already know, a long-time favourite of mine. The 2011 is firmly in that traditiion – yum! Then, two from 2006, and they were super. The Morey is the most impressive aromatically with iron, mineral and cherry, the Vosne takes over in the concentrated sweet palate. A really super pair – 2006s seem in quite a good place right now – if these are anything to go by!
Today, I was early in the car, heading t the Côtes. Warm and sunny at 07h00 in Switzerland, it was sullen and cooler in Chassagne when I arrived – thunder-storms were forecast for today – the rain began about 10h15. Quite a lot of rain too – just what the dry vineyards would like – but it’s brought cool temperatures too, so hopefully less risk from storms later in the day.
Chassagne, looking to Puligny
Puligny, looking to Meursault
