Just when I think there can't be any new beautiful views of the vineyard, another one pops up in front of me. The photo above was taken this morning. The vines are all empty of fruit now and will go into dormancy soon. The same goes for me.The last two days have been long. The eminent arrival of rain complicated the scenario somewhat. Scott decided he didn't want to leave Abby's Block on the vine any longer. However, you have to give the contractor three days notice if you want to have a crew provided. So, Scott sent out his regular crew to do harvest. He paid them what he would have paid the contractor, or $1.65 per bucket. I was not one of the crew out harvesting. I was in the nice warm, dry cellar working with the developing wines.
One of our primary jobs right now is getting the fermentation process going on all of the wines. I discussed punch downs yesterday. There are two different types. When the juice is in the cold soak stage (that is before Scott has warmed them up and added yeast to begin fermentation) all you have to do is gently push down the cap into the liquid. The grapes at the surface tend to dry out, and all this process is does is keep them hydrated. The other kind of punch down is being demonstrated by Scott on one of the large feremters. That handle he's holding on to is over four feet long.
While the guys were out harvesting I was pumping wine around. First we had two more fermenters that had to be brought up to temperature. Then Scott wanted several of the bins to be pumped over. In this process you suck juice off the bottom of the fermenter and have it flow back over the top. This adds oxygen to the wine. I have totally lost track of what we have done to which container, and we have twice this many sitting back in the barrel room. Luckily everything is written down. I find myself going back to the papers over and over, making absolutely sure I'm doing what Scott wants me to do.
After lunch today, it was time for more crush. We sort and de-stem Abby's Block first. Then we move on to the Syrah (which the crew also harvested), and then we take care of some Pinot Noir that came from another vineyard. After the sorting table the grape clusters go down the shoot that you can see in the photo to the right. The auger sends them along into the de-stemming device. One guy stands on a ladder all day and picks up leaves and stems that make it through both the sorting and de-stemming. I just can't imagine doing that. And remember, these guys are doing this work after they have done another job. It's really two days work all in one.
In the photo to the left you can see the two rollers that only allow the grapes to fall through. The device that does the de-stemming is a rod with finger like protrusions which are in a kind of spiral staircase configuration. They guide the grapes through a round tube that has square holes in it, which are about the same size as the grapes. When all of the grapes have been processed and put away the clean up begins. I've found it's best to just get out of the way and let the crew work. The primary tool for cleaning is the Lamba steam cleaner. I don't know how you'd run a winery without such a machine. It is powerful. Unlike your home pressure washers, it runs on 220 power. And that's just for the water pressure. The water is also heated by a diesel powered burner. I was using it the other day to clean off the top of the wine press, and when I pulled the trigger it almost blew me off the ladder.
In the photo to the right, Berto is standing on top of the destemmer pulling it apart so that it can be cleaned. Everything is steam cleaned. The inside parts, the outside surfaces, and the concrete floor under the equipment.
Well, it's late and I'm starting to fade. Scott showed me a schedule tonight, and it turns out we may actually finish this work in the not too distant future. I'm glad now that I got my sabbatical extended to Thanksgiving weekend. Who knew we would have just barely finished up crush by then? 