Blog

The one positive of lockdown and travel restrictions meant that we could spend more time in our vineyards.

Some nine years ago the wonderfully eclectic bunch of very talented Bot River Winemakers challenged each other to grow the most luxuriant beard during harvest. The Shave Off on the 1st February marks the start of harvest each year as well as the start of a new beard. The grape harvest waits for no-one - when the fruit is ripe, it must be picked and taken to the cellar. There is little time for sleep and even less for time-consuming activities like shaving – this must take a back seat too, so beards in the vineyards and cellar are not unusual at this time of year.

Due to an administrative cock up, and the offender covering her tracks by shredding / burning / destroying all relevant paperwork, we were forced by the wine police to ‘uncertify’ some of our wine. We present to you File Thirteen.

We can’t believe that 2014 has disappeared! Last year was a challenging one, and the vintage certainly felt it. Heavy rainfalls in December 2013 and January 2014 put the cats amongst the pigeons from a winemaking perspective. This rain brought the harvest forward dramatically, and with that came a fair amount of rot and disease. Luckily, with 25 years of winemaking under Niels’ belt, we managed to see the warning lights early and picked before any major drama occurred in our vineyards. The ripeness levels happened at lower sugars which mean the wines of 2014 are lower in alcohol, and are showing fantastic finesse.

There is no such thing as a bad time to drink wine and Bot River’s Spring Weekend proved the point. With the pink-bunting-festooned Luddite Landrover as chariot and blossoms abounding in orchards and along the roadsides, the annual Spring weekend got underway.