It is beautiful here in the Napa Valley; Fall is in the air, the leaves are turning and falling to the ground and the grapes are just starting to be harvested.  It is very late this year and with the rain they had things may be difficult for the 2011 harvest.  The weather has been excellent, in the 80’s this week!

Napa Valley

Rows and Rows

Cab Grapes

2014 Summers Estate Cabernet

All the vines are still mostly green and loaded with fruit.  We stopped into Summers Winery as we could see they were doing something in the barn!  They were crushing the Cab Grapes and we were lucky enough to meet Ignacio who is the winemaker!  He was supervising his small crew in crushing grapes and checking the vines where they are being sprayed for a form of fruit rot which is happening because even though the weather is warm it is very humid here in the mornings.  Ignacio took the time to chat with Paul and I about his grapes and what they are doing.  He says they are behind by several weeks, picking has been slow because the fruit hasn’t been ready but they are picking now and will be done soon.

Paul got right in there and helped to remove the stems that the machine missed!

Ignacio invited Paul back to help whenever he would like!  Maybe Paul can earn enough money for us to enjoy a bottle or two of this fine wine!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 19th, 2011 at 10:24 am and is filed under California. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.