No rest of the wicked

One of Dads employees said this to me yesterday. I'm stilling trying to work out what I did that was so wicked.

On Thursday I started work at 6:45 am - laying out lugs and supervising the picking.

Next I went to the winery to plunge the must bins. These are half tonne bins full of crushed grapes. Yeast has been added and fermentation has begun. The juice separates from grape skins, so to increase contact between the two to allow pigment extraction from the skins these bins must be plunged three times a day. Initially it is very hard work with the skins cap being 30 cm deep - it can actually push the lid of the bin, but it gets easier during fermentation.

I then had to lay out more lugs, before picking up 108 lugs of Viognier that was picked the day before. Viognier (at least the clone we have) forms very tight bunches, so while a lug of grapes normally weights 15 kg, these weighed more.... tipping them into bins at chest height, while wasn't quite a struggle, wasn't all that easy.

Some people from Canberra came to see to winery and taste the wines. I think they actually expected us to entertained for the whole day. This was never going to happen. For one, we were really busy and secondly Dad was too concerned about their welfare, mainly that of the three very young children who wanted to run around - as kids do. Shouldn't be a problem, but that morning there had been a fatality in a winery, the second in the past two months and we had the harvester, a few tractors and few semi trailers around, so Dad suggested they visit some of the other wineries in the area. Once they left I plunged the bins again.

Then on to picking up the 93 lugs of Cabernet and Merlot* that was picked in the morning. These had to be loaded onto pallets to be stored in the cold-room.

After rearranging the cold room to fit more in, Dad decided we needed to press the Pinot Noir and Gamay I had fermented as we needed to bins for the Cab and Merlot we had just picked. We pressed 2 tonnes into a barrels and tanks.

I plunged the bins once more and measured the sugar levels.

By the time we cleaned up it was 11:30pm and all Id had since breakfast was two cups of tea and a few almonds..... I was starving and it was also absolutely freezing. Boo was also very cold and very hungry. I fed her, put her winter coat on - when she first got it she didn't really like it, but is now grateful for it.

After dinner all I wanted was a relaxing hot shower before bed, but once in the shower I found the huntsman spider who had taken up residence in the bathroom a few weeks back decided Dad's shampoo would be an interesting place to visit. However it didn't take into account the steam from the shower making the shampoo bottle very slippery. The poor spider was desperately grabbing at anything and holding on for dear life. The poor spider. This also didn't result in a very relaxing shower for me**.

The following day I got to sleep in and didn't start working until 8:30! We picked some more grapes, again I just had to lay out lugs and then collect them before loading them on to pallets for the cold room. I picked up nearly 2 tonne of grapes. I must be getting a little stronger.... but the last 20 or so lugs are still difficult.....

After plunging the bins for the second time, Dad said I could have the rest of the day off. However after talking with a few transport companies - he had been trying for three days to get transport for the Viognier, but he couldn't get it - he realised he would have to drive them to Griffith himself and asked me to go along. We left at 7:30pm, got to Griffith by 11pm, left at midnight and got home by 3:30am. Once we left Griffith I drove while Dad slept. Focusing at that time of night was a little difficult, especially because the roads out of Griffith are so long and straight - I would have loved a few turns to focus on. After an hour or so Dad woke up and took over. So much for my evening off.

I had fed Boo before we left but forgot to put her coat on. When we got home I went to see her. She was happy to see me, but couldn't get up, she was too stiff and cold. She was shivering so much I felt awful for not putting her coat on before I left. I helped her warm up and left her to sleep.

And now a few picture from life here....

The lab, (more than) a little different from the other labs I have worked in.

Skin cap raising the lid

Half tonne bins full of grape must

The spider that so kindly joined me for my shower

The cool room is a little full at the moment

One of the harvesters

*Not 100% sure it is Merlot, a lot of Cab Franc was planted in Australia as Merlot. You can no longer get it genetically tested so we aren't quite sure, but they are somewhat similar anyway... just don't mention it, there are some people in the wine industry here that don't want to know about it....

** Either it enjoyed the experience or was deeply traumatized as he was still clutching the shampoo bottle the following afternoon, so before I put it outside before my next shower.