Couple of references: 

Domaine Anne Gros:  http://www.anne-gros.com/

Link to the site about her guest house in Vosne Romanee:  http://www.maison-lacolombiere.com/

The maps I refer to constantly came off the Burgundian wine website, this is the home page:  http://www.burgundywine.net/

Argh... just went in to try to find the maps on the site for a more specific link, and couldn't, also cannot seem to find any way of posting the pdfs of the maps I had downloaded last summer and the URLs at the bottom of my downloads aren't working, the site returns error messages.  Rats.  My apologies.  Happy to email to anyone who asks.

A fellow vendangeur, Jan van Roekel, keeps a website:  http://www.burgoholic.com

Update 13 October:  Jan has posted his blog - he worked at a couple domains, and checked in with other vignerons; also his site contains a general report on the harvest conditions and other bits of news.

Also - those folders on the left, July 2008 and Vendange 2008 - have pictures.  Do take a little look!

Feedback and questions welcome!

thanks
cynthia

your humble blogger, last July

Final farewells to Madame Gros and Anne’s team who were all working in the cave this morning, and to Anne herself, of course.  When I went to her office to collect my pay I handed her €5 and asked to keep the secateurs for souvenir.  She laughed, and took the money.  When she gave me my pay, she also gave me a bottle of her Chambolle Musigny Combe d’Orveau 2006.  I am looking forward to drinking that.

 

Pulled on my knapsack, said I really should have been a porter, I was in much better form for the job, with the backpack and all the walking I do.  Maybe next year.

 

Village and vinyards noticeably quieter today – every morning so far this week there had been a roaring of tractors and and minivans heading out, which crescendoed about 8:00 am, today none of that at our end of the village.  As I walked I saw very few crews out in the vinyards.  There are still grapes to be harvested – still can’t make up my mind about La Tache, but La Romanee is still unharvested, parts of Les Grands Eschezaux [see photos], and as I walked on towards Gevrey, Les Musigny needed doing, though there was one group of vendangeurs at the foot of the hill just knocking off for lunch. 

 

In Chambolle Musigny those village vinyards I like so well south of the village were mostly done, though again a group of vendangeurs just knocking off from working in Les Eschezaux which is the parcel at the foot of that little rising vinyard south of the village.  The Chambolle Musigny vinyards north of the village were half and half.  Ditto Morey St. Denis and Gevrey Chambertin – I could see some parcels done, but many still to go.  As I was walking between 11:00 and 14:00, it was lunchtime just as I was reaching Chambolle Musigny, so don’t know how much was underway in the latter three villages.  Certainly I could hear the unmistakeable sounds of lots of vendangeurs at lunch as I passed the various domaine buildings!

 

At Gevrey, took one last photo, this time looking up the hill over Mezis Chambertin towards Clos des Ruchottes at the top of the hill.  After I took the photo I doffed my pack and lay down on the stone wall to kip and soak up a last dose of Burgundian sun. [653]

 

That gentle splashing sound you hear is teardrops on my keyboard.  It is over.  Suddenly, all done.  Just as I passed the threshold and no longer felt any pain, just as I got the hang of flicking small bits of pourriture out of a bunch with the point of my secateurs, just as I was nearly keeping up with the others, it was all over.  >> Sob! <<

 

I think we did four different little vinyards this morning, all east of the village, which get blended for the bourgogne rouge, varying degrees of clay versus stony soil, all big fat juicy grapes in big voluptuous picture perfect bunches, as I was cutting them that phrase “easy drinking” kept coming to mind – they were easy drinking personified.

 

In the afternoon we returned to the Haute Cotes du Nuit, and did a small parcel of white and then finished the red begun yesterday.  Day was milder than yesterday, not so chilly, but high overcast, and we finished just as a minor shower began.  At the first sprinkle Pascale and Patrick had a huge sheet of plastic out to cover the bins, lest the wine get watered down by raindrops on the grapes.

 

Back to the domaine, we all gathered to celebrate the end of the vendange.  Madame Gros made some wonderful cakes – a plain yellow gateau, a couple dozen apple tartlets, and a honey and spice cake which is a speciality of Dijon.  Anne opened some white Haute Cotes de Nuits Cuvee Marine (named for her youngest daughter) and some of the Bourgogne Rouge.  On Saturday and Sunday, for the start, we had had about 30 vendangeurs, Monday perhaps 20 with the loss of the school and university students, Tuesday I think we had a dozen as most of the family members concluded their long weekend breaks, and today we were down to nine. 

 

After the cakes and wine, I was again kindly tolerated on the sorting table for the last of bourgogne rouge, and that was that. 

 

To add to my desolation, it turns out that because Burgundy was a bit late, and the Minervois was a bit forward, there is actually no need for me to go down there to harvest – it’s all over except one little vinyard, not worth my going down for.  So, tomorrow I pack it all up and will again walk back as far as Gevrey Chambertin before picking up the bus to take me to the Dijon Ville train station to take me to Paris etc. and back to old blighty.

 

One interesting side bar – Elodie, Anne’s assistant who had taken me on the tour of the vinyards in July, was telling me that with one of their wines, I think she said the Haute Cotes de Nuits rouge 2005, they decided to split the bottling one third traditional cork, one third capsule (screwtop) and one third plastic “cork”.  She said the screwtop was for the American market, because that’s what they want, the cork for the French and restaurant market, because that’s what they want, and the plastic will go to anyone else after that.  She said that on another wine – I am not sure which one – they had done a trial of a some small percentage of bottles with screwtop, and a couple years on opened the screwtop and the same vintage in cork, and compared.  She said the screwtop wine had a nose like petrol, whereas the traditional cork bottle had a proper nose of the scents they would have expected.  She said the taste of the screwtop was good, but the cork was better, more subtle.  I gather they favour cork, themselves, but the demand from America is for the screwtop. 

 

All told, no doubt I will do this again and again, as long as I can drag my sorry old self  down the rows.  This is not a job for the physically shy or fastidious – you spend most of the day bum uppermost, or humping along on your knees using your bucket as a zimmer frame – personally I still need to master the full squat duck waddle move.  You are very quickly very filthy and sticky – and this was in good weather on clear days – and you will gets cuts (which means blood wiped on your jeans or shirt) and bruises and a very sore back and knees – I shall never forget the words “dos” and “genoux” as long as I live – and leaves and twigs in your hair and dirt under your nails and quite a lot of grape juice squirted in your face till you get the perfect hang of flicking those bits of pourriture with the point of the secateurs.

 

On the other hand, I won’t forget Arnaud’s beautiful whistling while he worked, Bernard’s disquisition on the beauties of the different regions of France one afternoon, Guillaume’s almost nonstop cheerful banter and teasing (even unable to follow most of what he was saying, I was in stitches) as well his bellowing of “Pannier!” which raised echoes in the Combe d’Orveau, or my tormentor gently catching all my errors and teaching me better with a twinkle in his eye.  Or the smokey scent of the grapes, or the sting of grape juice squirted in my eye, or the sound of the tractors going home in the evening.  Or the tremendous kindness of all these people whose language I mangled.

 

Closing image – the road to Vosne Romanee as seen from the hill above Les Musigny, and the Chateau de Clos de Vougeot just on the left.  [614]

Losing track of time, except when I log on.  The trick I think is if you are going to bend over, you just go straight to total jacknife – anything between 0 and 180 degrees is a mistake.  Anne assured me after the third day you were ok.  I didn’t want to tell her it was day four and I wasn’t yet.  She also said after the first week it’s easy to go for a month.  She must really need help in the Minervois. 

 

The thing is, with every vine you have to weigh several factors and make a snap decision between bending over or kneeling down:  are there enough bunches to make it worth creaking up and down from your knees?  Are the bunches all or mostly low enough that full  jacknife is the better option?  If they are mostly a bit higher up you are better off on your knees (see comment above about degrees of bend).   And the other consideration is when was the last time the pannier came round?  If he JUST took a refill you are safe going down on your knees, but inevitably I misjudge and just as I have lumbered down the cry goes out, and I have to bounce (hah!) up again to hand over my bucket for dumping into the pannier. 

 

Other than that, it’s been a thoroughly enjoyable day.  No, really.  It’s been overcast most of the day and a bit cold except late morning.  We finished the Chambolle Musigny – which is just west of La Combe d’Orveau, which is a parcel of premier cru just west of Les Petits Musigny.  If you look on the Burgundian website maps, you can see the combe extends a little further in an unmarked bit of AOC Communale – that’s Anne’s parcel of Chambolle Musigny.  We finished it before lunch, and after lunch went over to her Haute Cotes du Nuits, which is not on any of the maps on the Burgundian website.  I think, if I’m figuring this right, if you look at the map of Vosne Romanee at the top, there is a road that cuts west through Aux Brulees, which takes you – I am not kidding here – over the hill and through the woods, and on the other side is a high plain for the haute cotes, near a village called Concoeur.    We got about 2/3 done today, will return tomorrow to finish up, then harvest her white which is grown up there too, and I think there is another day’s work after that. 

 

One of Anne’s employees very often looks after me and helps me – well, all of them do – but this one also is mischievous and as much as he helps, he also likes to tease me a bit.  Today, I was crawling from one allee to the next by bending down (ugh!) and whilst passing between the rows of wires that hold the vines, I caught my bun (that’s buN – my hair) on the upper wire.  This man kindly untangled me from the wire, but also teasingly called me grandmere.  Argh.  I turned to another woman who is french but speaks english well, and asked her to tell him that I am going to study my french so hard that NEXT year I will be able to get even with him!

 

And yes, despite my whimpering there is no question in my mind I will come back next year.  Despite the racking pain and bruises and the rest I really am thoroughly enjoying this.  The vinyards and grapes themselves are enchantingly beautiful, and the people – even my tormentor, in fact especially him – have been incredibly kind, helpful and cheerful.  It really is a tremendous experience, I wouldn’t miss for the world.

 

Postscript

 

I don’t know if I mentioned, but I have never actually tasted any of Anne’s wines.  The wine merchants I frequent don’t distribute for her, and I have had no luck tracking down her wines in England – all sold out.  Well, tonight after dinner that was rectified. 

 

The routine here is such that, as I am staying here at the domaine, Madame Gros (Anne’s mother) kindly includes me in her family dinner at 8:00.  Anne and the others who are getting the grapes sorted and underway generally finish up about 8:30 or 9:00 and often come in for a bite before going to their respective homes, and Patrick is staying at the domaine for the week as well.  This evening, as it happened, Madame Gros and I were alone at dinner, and when Patrick joined us about 9:00 or so, we kept him company and chatted while he ate.  Bless him, he brought in a bottle of the Haute Cotes du Nuits 2006 - it was unlabelled and only partially filled, so perhaps he just drew it out of a cask?  Not sure.

 

I suppose my first and foremost tasting note is, this wine more than justifies the pain in my back, the bruises on my knees, the two cuts on my left hand and anything else I may have whinged about – I can’t remember it all myself, now. 

 

The nose has that lovely smokey scent which I have caught occasionally while harvesting in several vinyards, though oddly not the Haute Cotes du Nuits today – but it was a coldish day and overcast so not ideal conditions to bring up scents.  The wine has good acidity – your mouth waters some time after you’ve drunk, always a good sign I think – and the tannins are to my liking – I do like vivid tannins – they are absolutely there, a sort of gilded cage for holding together all the lovely fruit sensations – red and black cassis, blackberry, as well as the taste equivalent of that smokey scent, and a bit of clove … bliss. 

 

I’m ready to go back and finish that vinyard tomorrow.

 

I also learned that Patrick, when he’s not helping Anne with the vendange, works in a laboratory, doing blood work.  If I understood him correctly, he said if it’s red, he works with it.  He has been with Anne for 17 years, I think. 

 

I should also take this opportunity to mention the rest of Anne’s hard core year round team:  Elodie is her assistant who does a bit of everything in the vinyards, the cave and the office; she was the one who gave me the guided tour in July and bless her spoke un peu lentement so I could follow it all.  Arnaud has been chief shepherd out in the vinyards, assigning us to our rows, telling us where to go next when we finish one line, also keeps all the picking equipment in good order – the buckets and panniers get thoroughly hosed down at lunch time as well as the end of the day.  Pascale seems to be mostly in charge of the heavy machinery – drives the tractors, takes the lead on setting up the sorting table and the forklift and the bins for sorting.  Although they all have these other responsibilities for things sort of ancillary to the actual picking, all of them, and Anne too, did time with the secateurs.  No ceremony or hierarchy here, just a huge will to pitch in and get it done – and done right.

 

The Haute Cotes de Nuits rouge vinyard [644]

Sha sha sha sha shattered, I’m in tatters… can’t remember the rest, too knackered.  The real trouble has been the bad combination of the physical stress with sleeplessness – one of the other occupants of the dormitory snored intermittently, but they’ve gone, so I hope I will get sleep tonight. 

 

Up and out, another glorious day, again a cold (three layers of shirts and jackets) morning, shed the outermost or heaviest layer after the mid morning break, then apply an extra layer of suncream at lunchtime and then finally down to the t shirt for the afternoon kind of day.  Cool air, warm sun, nearly cloudless. 

 

First thing we did another bourgogne rouge vinyard east of the village, I lost my bearings a bit, besides Les Paquiers Anne has several parcels within Les Champs d’Argent which is more southerly, I’m not sure where we were exactly today.  Grapes from four different little parcels are blended for her bourgogne rouge.  After lunch we went to Anne’s Chambolle Musigny vinyard.  It is in the westernmost end of the Combe D’Orveau (the east end is premier cru) all the way back to the edge of the forest.  No photo, I was too enchanted (ok, maybe too tired) so will try to get one tomorrow when we go back to finish up. 

 

Again, gorgeous grapes, very little pourriture, and for the first time I found some bunches, or skeletons of bunches, which showed signs of bird damage.  In July I remember thinking I could hear birdsong, but saw very few birds in the vinyards, which surprised me.  I’ve thought the same again the past few days, only saw one bad magpie making a meal in Clos du Tart as I was walking through Morey St. Denis on Friday.  In Les Barreaux, where Anne’s Vosne Romanee parcel is (see photo 634) the vines nearest the woods were all covered with bright yellow netting today – I asked about it, and was told it was to protect against the birds, they come out of the woods.  I had also noticed yesterday a lot of shotgun cartridges on the ground there – again, someone confirmed to me they do a bit of shooting there for control. 

 

After we finished for the day, I decided to walk back to the domaine.  Arnaud certainly thought I was crazy, he slowed down and offered me space in his (already full) van, but I explained I wanted to walk, it was ok.  But it’s three kilometres… no worries.  He shook his head, clearly thinking mad english…

 

It was actually really really nice to walk – not only for my poor back, but the vinyards were incredibly still and silent.  I think I was all the way back to St. Vivant before I heard a tractor in the distance.  The tractors here seem to have a whinge pitched a bit differently from the ones I’m familiar with on english farms.  Or maybe it’s just the french accent. 

 

St. Vivant seems to be mostly harvested, couldn’t see a grape bunch on any of Lalou Bize-Leroy’s mad spiralling vines at the northern end, nor any grapes left on the section opposite La Romanee, nor any of the vines I could see on the side stretching all the way back to the village facing La Grand Rue.  La Romanee is still un-harvested.  La Tache, as much as I could see from Rue de la Tache, at the foot of the vinyard, looked done – not only could I not see any grapes, but the grass between vines looked pretty trampled.  [Addendum – I may have been wrong in this – had another good look at lunchtime Tuesday I could just about see some bunches hanging down, and there did not seem to be the usual debris of discarded bunches and torn leaves – so maybe not yet.  Either they ruthlessly edit the number of bunches per vine, or the bunches are higher on the vines and the foliage is hiding them.]

 

Bonne Nuit.

 

The Chambolle Musigny vinyard in the Combe d'Orveau, photo taken the following day:  [639]

The first deep knee bend of the day was killer, then it didn’t seem so bad for most of the day, then by mid afternoon everything hurt that could.  I’m trying to recall something I can’t quite – a friend ran the U.S. Marine Corps marathon, and had a t-shirt that said something like after some number of miles I thought I’d die, after some further stage I wished I'd die, and by the end I knew nothing could kill me.  I’m not quite to that final stage, but I imagine by the end of the week I will reach that point.  And have knees and a back of iron.

 

Up and out at 8:00 AM, to finish Clos de Vougeot, which we did in quite short order.  Then moved on to pick the Richebourg.  Nice to have the sun on one side of your face in Clos de Vougot, where the vines run roughly east-west, then to move on to Richebourg mid morning where they run roughly north-south, and work with the sun on your back.  It helped warm the stiff old back muscles. 

 

Richebourg, like Clos de Vougeot, has smaller clusters of smaller grapes.  Lush greenery starred with orange daisies underfoot conceals killer paving stone soil, thank god I knelt down gently and didn’t drop into it thinking it would be as cushy as it looked.  Anne’s vines are either side of a short stretch of retaining wall, with the more easterly vines down about 3 feet from the lot above for a good stretch.  I remember as I began picking them in the lower section that there seemed to be subtle differences in the grapes, damned if I can articulate those differences now, 8 or 10 hours later and knackered.  Apologies to any audience this may have.  Again enchanted by the beauty and fragrance of the grapes.  Very little pourriture, grapes really in good nick, it seemed.  At lunch time I helped at the sorting table back at the domain again, and we had very little to do, they were so clean and ripe.

 

Finished Richebourg after lunch, then moved on to Anne’s Vosne Romanee village vinyard, part of Les Barreaux.  I took one picture [634] as we tumbled out of the trucks, the vines run roughly north-south up a steep slope.  The photo is of the vines nearest the line of the woods at the west end, Anne’s parcel is further east, well away from the woods, so much better sunlight.  By the time we finished, maybe 5:00 ish, that first vinyard was totally in shade – and they were just arriving and starting to pick as we were leaving. 

 

For village wine, it has to be good – the grapes were small, well ripe, no pourriture, some small bunches at the top of the vines were not fully ripe and perhaps had a bit of mildew, we just left those behind.  Again, I did a little time at the sorting table on this harvest at the end of the day, and again, all of us there – including Pascale – commented on how clean they were, and how pretty.  

 

After that, we put in the last hour or so of the day in one of the Bourgogne Rouge vinyards, which is on the plain, east of the village and of the main drag, the N74, a parcel named Les Pacquiers.  Clay soil, dried and cracked, heavy solid bunches of large grapes, but the same meticulous care of the vines, pruned so the bunches were all at the bottom, and a pretty fair quantity of them.  Again, in good ripe condition and clean.

 

Whilst picking today, I was often in tandem with a man named Axel, whose wife and children joined in the afternoon, as they had done the day before.  Like me, he is someone who simply loves the wine and came to pick for curiousity and loved it, this is his second year.  I don’t know where exactly he is from, but he was very kind about my rotten french and managed to encourage me in conversation, mostly about the wines and wine makers we both knew in the region, and the vendange.  When we were finished and standing at the top of the hill of the Vosne Romanee village vinyard, he commented on the difference between Anne’s parcel versus the parcels either side – that she is more “bio” and the care she takes is in clear contrast to her immediate neighbours. 

 

There were several family groups in the picking, it was nice… small children “helping” their parents, one wife simply came out with the baby in the pram and sat on the sidelines watching.  That may change tomorrow, with the start of the week and back to school.  One man I met is studying to be sommelier at the viticultural school in Beaune, came just for the weekend, back to university tomorrow.  Interestingly, he said (if I understood his french correctly) that they actually have done very little tasting as yet, will do some later, but tasting was not a big part of the course. 

 

At lunch sat beside someone who joined today, Jan van Roekel, a Dutchman who is also just thoroughly in love with Burgundy and burgundian wines, he has a web site,  burgoholic.com, I’ve not looked at it yet (as I write, I still have not figured out about getting an internet connection, I’m keeping this off line till I do).  He is doing a couple days with Anne, followed by a couple days with another vigneron in Morey St. Denis.

 

And on the subject of websites, shame on me for not doing this sooner, Anne’s website is at  anne-gros.com .  Last July I stayed at her gite, thanks to Jasper Morris MW of Berry Brothers and Rudd for recommending it when I was at a loss to find a place at this end of the Cote de Nuits  (see maison-lacolombiere.com which is also accessible from her main website).  On her website she asks for vendangeurs, so at the end of my stay I volunteered – she promptly asked for my national insurance number to get me on the payroll.  So here I am…

 

A few more photos in the folders, meanwhile, image of the day:  [632] Looking over Richebourg about 10:00 in the morning southeast towards the village of Vosne Romanee.  To the left you can see one of the porters with a pannier on his back.  Anne's own parcel is to the left, beginning about where the porter is and extending off the edge of the photo.  I had to snap photos quickly as we tumbled out of the trucks, or when we were getting ready to leave, so they aren't always of quite the right few vines.  But it should give you the drift.

At last… they warned me about the back ache, they didn’t tell me about my knees…

 

Breakfast at 7:30, then out and to Eschezaux at 8:00, and started picking.  First thing we were given a pair of secateurs and told to hang on to them all week long – if we lost them, our pay would be docked €5.  Then we were assigned rows, and a porter was assigned to gather from several rows.  The porter walks back and forth in the middle, and if we needed to empty our baskets we called out “pannier”, if he was getting bored and wanted some attention HE would call out “pannier”… We tended to work together, the same pickers with the same porter all day – it’s how you found your place in line, was to look for your porter, Raoul for my group.

 

I am the only non-french person in a gang of about 30 today, and they are really kind to me, patiently speaking slowly – I am thoroughly ashamed of my french, must do better for next year.  One man, Jean-Marc, who I gather is rather a veteran, has worked with me in adjacent rows all day, and been really helpful – if I fall behind, he doubles back and cuts my row to help me catch up, and I can show him bunches I’m not sure of, and he tells me if it’s ok or not.  Anne’s children are there – very humiliating to see a ten-year-old moving at twice your own speed and confidence – as well as several teenage friends of her older two children, and the others seem to be relatives, friends, and long term veterans.

 

Had to learn the difference between pourriture  and confiture – if it’s just a bit dried up looking, that’s ok, that’s confiture – and Anne popped one into my mouth to prove just how good they taste in that state, very concentrated.  The pourriture is the grey-greeney fluffy stuff – and that’s no good.  There was a fair degree of it in Eschezaux, but we edited the grapes as we cut them into the buckets, then they were sorted by the pro, Patrick, on a table on the truck as the porters dumped out their panniers, and then they were checked over one more time back at the domaine before they went into the de-stemmer (further detail below). 

 

Glorious day, clear, sunny, cold to start, air cool all day but warm sun, couldn’t ask for better weather.  Very EU rules (and certainly sensible in this situation too) about taking mid morning and mid afternoon breaks, stopping for a massive lunch at noon back at the domaine, then stopping at 6:00.  Mind you, the long lunch at noon, two hours, also allows time for the morning’s grapes to get sorted and processed into the vats and still allow the people doing that to grab a bite to eat.  Not a soul amongst the vines after 6:00, they were all climbing into trucks to go home.  Madame Gros, Anne’s mother, together with her cousin Jacqueline, are doing all the cooking, bless them, and also coming out the vinyards to cut.

 

After lunch, we finished Eschezaux, then went to Clos de Vougeot and started there – will need to finish tomorrow.  Several noticeable differences in terroir:  first, from a strictly selfish point of view, the soil is stonier in Eschezaux – I was grateful for the padding to the knees provided by a bit of grass between vines in Clos de Vougeot, albeit shame about the thistles.  The other thing that struck me was that the grapes were a bit different – more clusters made up of small clusters, and generally smaller grapes than Eschezaux.  Also a real determination to defy gravity – largely successful – I got a little confused looking for the stem to cut, till I got the hang of the fact it was at the BOTTOM of the cluster in Clos de Vougeot as a rule.   Also almost no pourriture – Anne had said earlier that Eschezaux was the worst, the other vinyards are much better, and certainly in Clos de Vougeot you could cut and pretty much dump in the bucket without the the meticulous examination needed earlier in Eschezaux.

 

I have to say, grapes are truly beautiful things.  The aroma was intoxicating, a little smokey and concentrated-grape-scented, and the colours in the sun, whether fully ripe opaque blue black or unripe still slightly translucent plum red-purple … despite the bruised knees and sore back, I am enchanted. 

 

At the end of the day, being a nosy parker, while everyone else dispersed, I walked round to the cave to see what was going on.  I ended up climbing up on the sorting table to help.  Sorting routine is:  as we cut out in the vinyards, we dump on the ground unripe bunches, or cut out any patches of pourriture or unripe sections of otherwise good bunches.  Fully ripe, the grapes are almost like blueberries – very navy blue with a black undertone and sometimes a silvery blush.  Our buckets are dumped into the big panniers which the porters carry on their backs, which in turn are dumped into big red bins on the back of a tractor trailer.  Patrick does the brunt of the fine sorting standing on the truck while we cut.  Rejects are collected in buckets which are then dumped back into the vinyard (this has got to be the world’s classiest compost).  When done, and back at the domaine, a forklift truck takes one of the big red bins off the tractor trailer, and hoists it up on a level with a sorting machine table. 

 

Now this is fun stuff – the sorting table is a very Wile E Coyote and Bugs Bunny  looking contraption – on feet which must be adjusted to ensure the whole thing is level (and they did this meticulously with a spirit level), are two shelves about three feet off the ground on which we stand at a shallow bin-table which is at our stomach level as we stand on the shelves.  The forklift holds the red bin up, aligned with the sorting table, and we open it carefully by first loosening the end panel, allowing just the juice to run down.  It filters down through holes in the sorting table into pans below which catch juices and pips and things that filter through the colander like sorting table.  Later these pans, also glorified sieves, will be stirred up by hand to let all the juices flow through into another big bin below.  When all is done, there is a tap which allows this juice to be drained off into buckets which will get dumped into the vats along with the de-stemmed grapes.  Meanwhile, up on the sorting table, when the juice seems to have run off from the red bin, we remove the end panel altogether, and start pulling the grapes down into the pan, first with our hands, and then one person wields a rake to pull them down onto the table little by little. 

 

Did I say this entire contraption is vibrating?  So the grapes are shook down and we (who are being shook too) spread them out and look them over one more time, pulling out any leaves or debris and catching the odd bunch which is unripe or has a bit of pourriture, which Patrick either trims or chucks entirely, depending how bad it is.  The shaking moves them all along to the far end, where the grapes get shook (am I being grammatical?  I’m tired) down into a sort of cradle with a corkscrew revolving in it – this de-stems them.   Stems gets dumped in one stream straight out the bottom, grapes make a right hand turn and start going up a conveyor belt into the vat designated for this vinyard or wine. 

 

For every red bin full of grapes that went into the vat, Patrick poured out a measure of sulfur solution and poured it in the vat.  At the end of it all, Anne dumped in dry ice (carbon dioxide).    

 

Very few photos today, see folders, it is hard to take photos in the vinyard when your hands are grubby and sticky, also I’m a bit shy of photographing people who may not like it, so you probably won’t get much in that line at all.  I took one rather bad one of the sorting table on the truck [622], and I asked someone to take photos for me of the sorting and de-stemming process back in the cave – 623 shows Patrick and your humble blogger, also the back of Eveline, another vendengeur who pitched in, but you can get the idea of the table and red bin and the grapes being raked down.  The big blue boxes behind us are the vats where the grapes macerate, you can see the one behind Patrick marked HC – for the Haute Cotes grapes that will go into it eventually. 

 

At the end of the day, this is what Clos de Vougeot Tres Tres Nouveau looks like in the vat, that ghostly fog is the result of the dry ice just thrown down.  [626]

Had good luck with trains, and got from London to Dijon yesterday.  This morning I took a bus from Dijon to Gevrey Chambertin, and then walked from there to Vosne Romanee. 

 

As we were passing through Marsannay it looked like the vendange was in full swing, quite a lot of crews out, it felt very bustling.  By contrast, walking through Gevrey Chambertin, Morey St. Denis and Chambolle Musigny I was struck by how very still and silent it was, nothing but crickets or the odd bird to be heard.  I didn’t see a soul out in the vinyards, though someone must have been picking somewhere – as I passed through Morey St. Denis I stopped to watch two men working.  They had a sort of dump-truck full of white grapes, tipped up and dumping them into a pan on the ground, from whence the grapes seemed to be getting riddled into a big pipe which led into a cave.  I have a habit of putting my hand to my mouth, I think one of the men misunderstood the gesture – he blew me a kiss!  Nothing if not friendly, these Burgundians! 

 

Once I was near the Chateau de Clos de Vougeot there were a few folks beginning to harvest – some in Eschezaux, some in Clos de Vougeot, south of Anne’s vines, and also in the villages vinyards directly south of Clos de Vougeot. There were also some pockets of activity scattered throughout the Nuit Saint Georges vinyards north of that village.  Mostly clear day, was cloudy around noon (for which I was grateful, toiling along with my pack), otherwise warm sun on cool air and a fair breeze. 

 

Lots of photos posted, but one here for instant gratification [602] taken from the top of Clos des Ruchottes in Gevrey Chambertin (forest at my back).  At the bottom of these rows of vines you can see the foot path – beyond it would be Mazis Chambertin, so looking east from a point southwest of the village.  I know God is an Englishman, but certainly he must have connections to Burgundy.

Like Bob Hope, I am (almost) on the road at last.  Anne Gros wrote to say the vendange would start Saturday the 27th, so tomorrow I am off.  Eurostar and SNCF willing I hope to get to Dijon tomorrow, then Friday bus to Gevrey Chambertin and from there walk down to Vosne Romanee.  In July that stretch was my favourite, I don't know how many times I walked it, both on the Route des Grands Crus and wandering in and out on the little paths between vinyards.  I look forward to seeing it again, ripened.  Weather reports are for unmitigated sunshine the next five days, but cool - 15 - 17 degrees C, down to about 7 at night, shiver.  Does one pack the panama or the tweed hat? 

One last photo from the summer - the vinyards at my feet are Appellation Villages, I think Les Creux Baissants, and that is the village of Chambolle Musigny - I am looking north.  If you turn and carry on to the right (east) from where I am standing, the path turns south around a butte of hill, and you suddenly get a view of the Chateau de Clos du Vougeot.  But I like this view better, for some reason.  To the left there is a steep chalky cliff behind the village, to the right, looking east by northeast, is a beautiful view across the plains and acres of vines, mostly Villages, some Premier Crus. 

(photos deleted in the interest of space saving!)

Emailed Anne Gros about my travel arrangements and received the following response today:


Just as well, as travel plans for Monday were looking increasingly dubious:  I would have had Southeastern train service strike mess to overcome before taking on the ongoing Eurostar post-chunnel-fire bookings mess to get over there.  Hopefully by mid week all that will be settled down a bit.

Meanwhile, in the interest of ongoing entertainment, here is another photo from the summer holidays:  vines in Les Grands-Eschezaux, taken 9 July.  Hopefully the grapes have progressed at least a little from this stage.

Someone foolishly said, "Oh, be sure to give me the link to your blog when you go to Burgundy!"  Honey, I would never have thought of doing a blog, but for you.... you know who you are, I hope your conscience will allow you to rest easy in future ... but I doubt it.  So, this is the test posting, see if I can do this.  Starting with, if I can work this out, a photo of the village of Vosne Romanee, taken from the top of La Tache on the 10th of July. 

God, Eurostar and the weather willing, I will be going back to Vosne Romanee to work the vendange for Anne Gros.  When last heard from (12 Sep) she said there would be no picking until the 24th.  Stay tuned.