Changes

One thing I remember about my short stint out here last year is the need to be flexible. Plans change constantly - sometimes it reminds me of the phrase: "The only constant is change." Yesterday morning was a perfect example. First, the weather. For the first time since I've been here this year, it was a cool, foggy morning. In fact, it was the first time it was colder outside the cave than inside the cave. That's a weird feeling. Second, we thought our custom crush client was going to be bringing in fruit yesterday - nope! He got down to the Santa Lucia Highlands and determined that it wasn't ready. That can happen despite the fact you might have taken a fruit sample earlier that seemed good to go. Mother Nature - a fickle lady.

So, speaking of samples, with some extra time on our hands (that one really makes me laugh) we headed to some of Freeman's vineyard sources to pull some samples. We travelled to Sexton, Rayhill and Guidici (joo-dah-see) vineyards. Lots of really nice fruit still hanging on the vine - should make some awesome juice.

The pic above is Eric with my fellow intern, Ray Walker. Ray is a good guy from Rohnert Park who has been helping out since bottling. Since he has been around a little while and I was here last year, I think (?) we have been able to get rolling pretty quickly on some things but I could be wrong. Anyway, Ray has already left his world in finance and is making big plans to start his own label. And guess what? He also has a blog!! http://vine2glass.blogspot.com/ Part of me wishes I had been his age when I caught the wine bug. He reminds me of one of the young star poker players that Norman Chad on ESPN jokingly derides as: "Ahhhh. He's just a kid with a dream." My guess is we will see some good stuff from Ray in future if he doesn't wipe himself out driving his fast cars!!

Next post: The '07 Zinfandel update.

Some more pics from the vineyards yesterday: