jamie goode's wine blog: Summer arrives late

Sunday, September 16, 2007

Summer arrives late

It's been a strange summer here in England. April was hot and flowering of the vines was really early. Then May, June, July and August were wet. Almost completely. The last week, however, has seen unbroken summer weather, with high temperatures and plenty of sun.

This weather pattern, shared across much of Atlantic-influenced Europe, could just save the harvest in many regions, where settled weather in September is just what was required to finish off ripening and allow picking free from rain.

This is not a vintage to be a biodynamic or organic winegrower. With all the dampness, decent protection against fungal disease will have been essential, and that's really hard with just copper and sulfur.

So we've been making the most of the good weather. Saturday saw cricket in the nets at Marble Hill park, followed by a long walk with RTL. Then we had some good friends round for a barbie and a reasonable quantity of wine, including my last bottle of the wonderful Glenguin Cabernet Sauvignon 1998 from Orange in NSW. I'd drunk a lot of this, a wine I'd purchased from Bibendum on my return from a trip to the Hunter Valley in 2000, where I was really impressed by the Glenguin wines.

Today was younger son's birthday, and to celebrate we took the boys and a few of younger son's friends motorcross riding in Walton (pictured). It was really very cool, and I was a bit jealous I couldn't have a go.

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