Bordeaux 2009: ‘Exceptional’
October 14th 2009, by Gavin
This post was also written for the Liv-Ex blog. The London International Vintners Exchange is the leading exchange for fine wine, and their site is a superb resource for knowing the value of top Bordeaux. They kindly asked me for ‘An Insider’s View‘ on 2009.
“Exceptional”. That’s the refrain at the leading châteaux in Bordeaux in 2009. Since mid-June, it has been warm, dry and sunny, and the glorious weather in the last ten days of September and the first week of October has allowed the top estates – on both Banks – to pick their Merlot and Cabernets in perfect condition.
Hail? What Hail?
October 9th 2009, by Gavin
As we come to the end of our harvest at Bauduc, we have hardly had a chance to reflect on an extraordinary vintage of triumphs and disasters. Everything looked great until the hailstorms in May. Then we lost a huge slice of the crop. Since the hail, the weather has been fantastic - so we were on the verge of a Perfect Storm: watching other vineyards enjoy a beautiful summer and early autumn, after ours had been badly hit. Salt on the wounds.
So how come we have made more white, more rosé and more red than last year?
Here’s how. It’s not a short or simple story, but this is France.
Red Harvest begins at Bauduc
October 3rd 2009, by Gavin
It’s another early start as we like to bring the grapes in quite cold, especially when the days are so warm. This way we can give the Merlot a ‘cold soak’ for a few days before fermentation, making for a tasty, juicy wine - hopefully. There is no rot whatsoever, so we’re just removing any leaves or green bits on the sorting table before the de-stemmer.
We’ve Found a Bigger Tractor
September 26th 2009, by Gavin
After the debacle of our tractor going up in smoke as it struggled with a trailer full of grapes, coming back from our newly leased vineyards up the road, I managed to find a chap with a slightly bigger one. Thierry also has a very fine trailer to go with it (apparently there are only six as big as this yellow one in the whole of the Gironde), which is handy as our singed effort is being repaired. Nelly may not be tall, but she can hardly reach the step of the John Deere. Unfortunately it’s all only on loan.
Tractor’s on Fire
September 24th 2009, by Gavin
Another mini-disaster movie. Maybe it’s just not our year…
The Quest for Vines
September 23rd 2009, by Gavin
Given that we’d lost most of our 2009 crop (and a fair chunk of 2010) to hail in May, we could either have thrown in the towel, or gone in search of more vineyards to buy, or take under lease. We were tempted by option A, but umpteen, welcome messages of support from customers - some on this site - persuaded us to get off our butts.
If we’d been in, say, New Zealand, we’d simply have gone out and found some grapes to make up the 80% loss. It would have been up to us - not the State - to ensure that the quality is good enough to go into our ‘brand’: about 70% of the grapes that go into Villa Maria’s consistently good wines, for example, come from contract growers.
