I cannot begin to explain excitement that Caro and I were feeling as we finally found Montgomery vineyard tucked away in the hills. Formerly a meadow, now flourishing with succulent grapes ready to turn into quality wine.
If anyone were to ask, “have you ever harvested grapes and where?” I am proud to answer my first experience was in Montgomery, Wales. What a wonderful welcome we had from Lenny, Woody, Gemma and team.
Today, the grapes we were picking were Solaris. We even had the opportunity to measure the Brix scale to test sucrose levels. You put the juice on the refractometer and point it towards the light which reads the sucrose levels, the perfect level being 22.
Row 42, snip snip snip! How therapeutic and peaceful. The rain came down, but we didn’t even notice. Such satisfaction gently putting a bunch of juicy grapes in the trays knowing they were going straight to the next level. The process of wine making would begin in the next 4 to 6 hours.
Coffee Break came along with more rain, but we couldn’t hang around and wanted to go back to help. Knowing everyone was working hard together as time was of the essence for Solaris 2018 to be made.
We got into the swing of it and soon joined the fruit farmers aka the professionals, trying to keep up and we were quite proud of our efforts.
Around 10,000 bottles will be made, it has been a good year and the yield of fruit is good. Cannot wait to taste it once it's in the bottle and looking forward to helping again in next year's harvest.
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