Early report from Gassac - Sept 2008

We started the harvest in the Gassac valley last Tuesday (Sept 2nd) with the picking of the Rosé Frizant at about 10.5° alcohol - twenty people from all around the world picking in 18kg basket to make sure the grapes arrived in perfect condition at the cellar.

The harvest of the white began on Sunday 7th Sept with 33°¨C and a beautiful blue sky; the red should start around Sept 18th.

Altogether this vintage is starting much later compared to the past two years, when we started around the 22nd/23rd of August but so far a fantastic vintage.

After a very wet spring - we got 2/3rd of an annual rainfall between March and the end of Mays, followed by a very late flowering in June, we have then experience one of the nicest summer of the past few years with some very mild temperatures (35°C to 10°C at night) and a couple of rainfall mid-July and mid-August.

As a result, we have had a much longer maturity (110 days from the mid-flowering of the white) and 120 days from the flowering of the red)

We believe we are facing an extraordinary vintage, even if it’s a bit early to assess the final quality that but we are certainly very hopeful as all the harvests ending in ‘8 in the Gassac valley have been hitherto outstanding: 1978, 1988, 1998 and....

The great news is that so far the yield are back to a normal level (35 hectolitres per hectare on average) after two vintages with almost 30% less production!