Another installment from Martin Krajewski on the progress of the harvest at Ch de Sours:
“After a very hot weekend when the temperature reached 32c on late Sunday afternoon, Monday started a little cooler and a bit overcast.
However, when the sun soon broke through in the late morning, it turned out to be quite a pleasant day until finally in the late afternoon, the humidty rose dramatically and a storm was on the way.
In the meantime we hand picked with our team of about twenty vendagers two blocks of Semillon, one at Monfaucon and the other called Grand Plantier, both near our winery and the resulting yeild was about 50 hl.
During the night it started to rain and by mid morning we had had about 3mm but the skies started to clear again late morning and we commenced the machine harvesting for the Rose at about 1pm.
It rained very slightly in the mid afternoon but by 4.30pm the sun was again breaking through and by 6pm it was a glorious late summer evening. The fruit was in remarkably good condition, no rot or signs of damge and some nice reasonably plump berries.
We continued harvesting until at 9.50pm and when the last trailer load of fruit came in total and we had completed 4.5 hectares.
Also late on Tuesday afternmoon I tasted (for the first time) the sauvignon blanc that was picked last week and had now started fermentation and it was quite MAGNIFICENT !
Lovely aromatic aromas and a beguiling taste of exotic fruits, led by ripe pineapples with a little bananna in the mix – quite wonderful and I think that will definatey be something to watch out for next year.
I also tasted the semillon which also showed really well, but is rather more like a blushing bride at this stage of its’ life, and will only reveal what lies beneath later on.
By the end of the days work and as the sun set in a deep orange fire ball over the vineyards, we also had moved all of the sauvignon blanc into barrel and tucked it away quietly to continue its’ fermentation.
The last of the merlot cleared the hopper at about 10.10pm and we started the press as well as washing and clean the tractors, trailers and harvesting machine, which will take about an hour, so they are ready for tomorrow morning.
The sky is absolutely black now and with only a few stars peeping through it’s difficult to see much without lights of the winery and the tractors, but in the far distance to the south, probably 10km’s or more away, we can see a very dramatic lightning storm.
It looks like being a late one tonight and most likely 1am before everyone gets off home BUT we will have something like 250 hl in tank and a fabulous start to the 2010 Rose.”