Blaauwklippen’s 2010 harvest kicked off at 7 this morning
with viognier picked from our lovely but unromantically-named Tekno Park vineyard across the street next to the Kleine Zalze winery. The first bins of grapes arrived at about 9, so we had some time to go over equipment use and logistics with our winemaker Rolf. My job for the day was running the crusher, which collects the grapes as we dump them from the bins and knocks them loose of their stems. They’re then pumped into the press, where they’re squeezed and pumped into a tank for fermentation. Here at Blaauwklippen we only use the yeast that is found naturally on the skins of grapes, so at that point the fermentation has begun.
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This weekend I was determined to go wine tasting – being
surrounded by incredible wine farms the past two weeks and only visiting two of them due to a lack of transportation has had me feeling like a eunuch at the Playboy mansion, so I made it my mission to find a tasting buddy with a good nose and a good set of wheels. I found both in Dana, my buddy who works in the
Blaauwklippen vineyard, and we took off on Saturday with nothing but wine in our plans.
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Today was our first day in the vineyard – it’s time to take
our first samples for analysis. Typically the first grapes harvested are viognier (our only white grape), merlot, and shiraz, so we tested the blocks of those grapes that tend to ripen earliest. (Note: For those of you reading who aren’t necessarily wine peeps – hi, Mom! – please excuse the technical jargon. And for those of you who are major wine peeps, please excuse the brevity of the technical jargon.
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My first week at Blaauwklippen and I’m completely in awe. There are mountains literally surrounding the winery, the air smells like a mixture of beach and tropical flowers, and the view of rolling hills covered with vineyards is absolutely breathtaking. I’m staying at the Jonkershuis, a very old house on the property with four bedrooms, a kitchen, and one shower.
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