ZABIBU

The sunshine this week has helped and with a test of the sugars this afternoon we are at 12.5% potential alcohol for the Pinot Noir which is as good as we will get this year before we start to lose the crop to the birds. The fruit is beginning to lose its firmness as well and so we have planned to be in the vineyard by 6am in the morning to pick the grapes. Louisa and Anne Hargrave arrived late last night and are hoping to see some elephants in between the winemaking so we will have a busy week ahead of us.

We will pick all but two rows of the Pinot Noir which we will leave to pick with the Chardonnay. We will do this the day after tomorrow to make a reasonable quantity of white wine.

Will give you readings of TA, pH and Brix tomorrow when we have this picked and the wine is in the fermentation vats.

Louisa Hargrave and her daughter Anne(from the Hargrave vineyards of the North Fork of Long Island) have now arrived and are ready for some action. They are not here for long so it is important that we make the best of their visit.

They had a taste of last years wine this evening at dinner. Their description of last years wine I will leave for this evening and instead I will post this in a few days if anyone is curious. We had some discussion tonight about when to introduce the malolcatic culture. We think that the Malolactic culture will be best introduced to run simultaneously with the primary fermentation. Will keep you posted on the progress over the coming days.