My Vineyard Blog October 2010

2010 vintage round-up

London, to a tasting of Noval and Noval Nacional vintage Ports at Berry Bros. & Rudd (see detailed notes to follow  on the Port pages of this website). Christian Seely, Managing Director of AXA Estates (which includes Quinta do Noval) tells me that this has been the longest vintage he can recall, starting at the end of August and only ending last Saturday, 23rd October. Their production was double that of 2009! The Port shippers are fairly positive but in reality I suspect there is rather too much ordinary wine in the Douro this year.

Vintage comes to an end

The 2010 vintage seems to have gone on for ever, and for the last two weeks it has had to continue without me. We finally finished picking yesterday and with no space left in the winery we sold the last of our grapes to a neighbour. Fortunately the weather was kind to us but some grapes took forever to ripen, especially those sections of the vineyard with the deepest soils and heaviest yields.