Wine, music and Mike Angus

Aaron, Mike, Carly

After much wine, delicious food, great music, delightful and sometimes straight-up hilarious conversation, our visit from our dear friend and uber-talented musician Mike Angus has come to an end. Tears. All good things come to an end, they say. Make sure to check out his music in our latest "what we are listening to" or the following link on cbc radio... http://radio3.cbc.ca/#/bands/Mike-Angus

Sometimes you just have to say "lets buy 'em!"

For a few years now Virginia and I have bought grapes from Murray and Maggie Fonteyne at Scout Vineyards just 8 km south of us. We have happily contracted their small blocks of riesling, pinot gris, and syrah. Every year  about tis time I walk around tasting their delicious grapes and marvel at the consistency of the vines. Each one looks exactly like the next. I've also had the opportunity each year to taste the cabernet sauvignon grapes that grow next to the syrah. These were always sold to another local winery and I couldn't help but think they would make some tasty wine here at Orofino. So when Murray offered them to us this year, we were very keen but had to see if we could afford them first, had room for them second, and if they would be a boost to our portfolio of wines. We just had to make it happen and now we are thrilled to say we are contracting everything Scout grows. I'll give updates on the cabernet as we follow them through ripening to barrel. Should be fun!

Anticipation grows...

This 2011 season has flown by. It is hard to believe that it was a year ago now that the Weber family so graciously welcomed my wife and I to be a part of Orofino Vineyards. I arrived thirsty for knowledge, and wine. John and Virginia are naturally teachers (i.e. patient), so not a day has gone by without learning something new. It started off a cooler season than usual, but I have learned to not get worked up about the weather when John reassuringly responds, "That's farming". And surely enough, we have had plenty of sun and heat over the last two months and look forward to this warm September. Weeks and weeks of tending to the vineyard by hand, of pruning and tying in the spring, the constant weeding, fixing plugged irrigation, the long days of tucking, leaf thinning and bunch thinning, ... have all wisped by and culminated in the anticipation of harvest. It truly is a labour of love. An entire year’s work, time, patience, frustrations and joys will all end up in that bottle. We are but a few weeks away. The grapes are nearly all turned to their rightful color and I am as excited as I am nervous to taste the end result.

Veraison

Veraison in our 22-year old Pinot Noir vines, Orofino Vineyards, Cawston Bench

Visiting Vineyards

Now that Labour Day has passed us by and the world was righted again with a Rider victory over Staggerville I have been busy visiting the vineyards where we source our grapes from.  Generally speaking I think things are about a week or so behind where we usually are at this time. Colour in the red grapes is coming but varies depending on the soil types of the site. Lighter rockier vineyards like Scout Vineyard is more advanced than our vineyard where heavier soils exist. The rockier lighter soils warm up quicker in the springtime and get an earlier start which really starts to show results in seasons like this one. The Passion Pit vineyard shows this dramatically as the rocky soiled top section of the Cabernet is fully purple already while the flat heavier section still has about 50% green clusters. Fortunately for us the weather has been amazing for the past 5 weeks and the forecast is for more sun and heat.  Nets go on later this week and then we wait.....