Grape Expectations (14 page)

With the vines well into their season we also had to think about the next phase after the growing: the winemaking. We were looking for a young, keen, modern wine scientist, or oenologist. Lucille Deneuve appeared to fit the bill.

  Lucille could speak English but she always spoke to us in French. Our French dictionary was always within reach. We liked her. Well, Sean really liked her. She was a blonde bombshell, someone you would have expected to find in St Tropez rather than in the vineyards of Bergerac: pretty but bright, with a luscious body that made men look rather too closely at certain wording – those in a particular area – on the Bergerac wine T-shirt she often wore.

  She recommended that we talk to and taste the wines of other local winemakers so we could tell her what style of wine we wanted to make. Her suggestions included a name I recognised as the young fellow I'd sat next to at lunch on Cécile's training course several months before.

  A few days later we visited Château Court-les-Mûts, the property of the Sadoux family. Their vineyard was just over a kilometre from us on the main valley slope going towards Sainte-Foy-la-Grande. From our house we could follow a rural route that took us past the mayor's vineyard down to the D14, the Route des Coteaux, offering the most stunning westerly views down the Dordogne valley all the way. The unassuming Pierre was a third-generation winegrower and their farm was the largest independent wine operation in the Saussignac appellation. We tasted his wines and talked about what had happened in the different vintages and how they made their wines. I was stunned at his openness. We would be direct competitors but despite this he shared his passion and knowledge without hesitation.

  Lucille returned for another visit sporting a slightly different Bergerac wine T-shirt that meant that Sean had to carefully check the new words printed in a strategic area. Despite my misgivings – how could someone so good-looking and so well endowed also be gifted at winemaking? – she seemed thorough and genuine. To top it all, she had worked at one of the top estates in Médoc, a favourite of ours, before becoming a consultant. It was serendipity. We decided to appoint her as our oenologist.

  Lucille did a tour of the winery and promised to let us know what we needed to buy before the
vendange
. The word
vendange
, harvest, struck excitement and terror deep within me. It was months away but I already felt my nerves tighten at its mere mention. There again, the little word 'buy' also gave me a frisson of fear as we had completely emptied the coffer for equipment.

  As we walked around the dingy interior of the winery I felt dread. It was dark and dirty. I had déjà vu to our arrival in the shuttered kitchen the first day at Garrigue but I could tell that this would take a lot more work than the stainless steel sink and kitchen cupboards. We needed to service the presses, clean and sterilise the winery from top to toe and purchase some small pieces of equipment. Still, the 'wish list' from our oenologist was not as daunting as I had expected.

  The following morning my brain churned through our precarious financial position as I watched the dawn creep across the vineyard over my steaming cup of two-bag brew, now a well-installed habit that offered me a deep sense of comfort in this unfamiliar world. I had finished an entire pass of the vineyard in three weeks. My fingers absent-mindedly stroked the mass of scratches on my right hand, testament to the thorny walls around our vines. It was almost time to start the weeding and shoot removal again but Sean was back on form and I could bow out of the vineyard and get back to my renovations.

Summer was upon us. With the long, hot days the fruit progressed at a rapid rate from hard, green peas to soft, sweet grapes in a few short months. Sean worked all hours.

  A party of AOC 'police' arrived including Joel, the vigneron with the mass of greying-blonde hair who had scared me the first time I met him, and our old friend from the Chamber of Agriculture, Monsieur Ducasse. They were on site for yet another
contrôle
(check) of the vineyards that we had declared for Saussignac production. This time they were checking the development of the fruit, the yield, the vineyard health and cleanliness – no weeds – to ensure they met appellation standards. Sean was out working in the merlot so I showed them the five rows below the
pressoir
that he had ear-marked for Saussignac, our dessert wine.

  'These vines are too loaded,' said Monsieur Ducasse, his eyebrows frowning to underline his point.

  'The grapes are too big and not ripening fast enough,' said Joel, adding salt to the wound.

  Sean would be furious if we were stopped from making Saussignac because of a few observations by this inspection team.

  'We only want to do five rows,' I said. 'Maybe we should look at the other vineyard Sean declared. Perhaps it will be better for the Saussignac.'

  Ellie was asleep safe in her cot so I locked the house and took them down to Lenvège, where there was a mix of ancient sémillon, sauvignon blanc and muscadelle white grapes. With foresight Sean had declared more vineyard than we wanted to do.

  'These are far better,' said Joel. 'But you need to do some green harvesting and some de-leafing.'

  Green harvesting is the removal of some of the grapes a month or two before harvest so there are fewer grapes per vine and hence less for the vine to mature, which is thought to result in better quality. De-leafing is the removal of leaves around the fruit zone so the fruit has sun directly on it, thought to aid the ripening.

  'You can harvest half of the grapes when you harvest your dry white so you won't have to waste them,' said Mr Ducasse, his eyebrows working overtime. 'And it's better because you don't want to leave the grapes here on the ground as they will attract bad rot.'

  A few days later, taking their instructions to the letter to ensure that we would have Saussignac in the range, Sean removed leaves on the rows we had chosen while Ellie and I meticulously ate the grapes that fell to the ground to make sure we didn't encourage any bad rot in the vineyard.

With most of the house dating back to 1737 we were guaranteed a few surprises of the kind that inevitably accompany the renovation of an antique.

  The drains in our new kitchen stank and with the rising heat the stench had increased. A neighbour explained a drain 'fix' to me: force a hosepipe running water back and forth in the blocked drain until the hose appears on the other side and the water runs clear. It sounded easy so I found a hosepipe, rolled up my sleeves and donned hermetic gloves.

  Lifting the drain covers offered instant olfactory confirmation of the problem.

  After some exploration I found the best arrangement was lying on the ground with my arm buried in the drain. This was closer to the drain than I liked but effective and unexpectedly satisfying. I dislodged a bald tennis ball almost the size of the drain itself.

  The next section of the drain was not as obvious. I could find no sign of a cover so I assumed it went directly to the septic tank. A neighbour, Pascal, who lived in the house in front of Sonia and Fred, arrived to say hello. He was a wiry, handy man who loved dropping by to see how our renovations were progressing. He pointed out grains of rice in a pool of water on the track at the corner of the house.

  'Perhaps it comes out here,' he said.

  The pool of water was constantly full, even with no rain. Sean and I assumed that it was a bad drainage point. The water meter showed no sign of a leak.

  'It's what
les anciens
used to do,' said Pascal. 'The kitchen waste water emptied down the side of the house.'

  It smacked a little of the bathroom
broyeur
. I dug into the point where the trickle of water originated. A very foul whiff rose up and Pascal quickly said goodbye.

  I found the end of the drain buried about a foot below the trickle. After digging, pushing, pulling and cursing, a foot-long plug of ancient muck dislodged from the end of the drain pipe I had uncovered. It seemed unbelievable but this had been the main water exit for the kitchen and it looked like it had not been cleared since its construction.

  A few minutes later the water ran clear and I felt like I had conquered the world. I had solved the immediate stench problem but the longer-term solution of routing it to the used water tank would need the expertise of Jean-Marc, the plumber.

The worst heatwave of the year hit as my mother arrived for a two-week stay. She had picked up that in the aftermath of Sean's accident we were not coping at all and had decided to come and help, plus she would see her granddaughters. My mother had been with us for the coldest winter and was now experiencing the hottest summer. When I opened the door onto the courtyard, it was like stepping into a massive oven. The car thermometer registered 45 degrees in the afternoons. We stayed indoors after nine in the morning and closed all the shutters. At ten at night as darkness settled we opened the shutters and enjoyed a few hours of relative cool before the blazing sun started the bake again. The only refuge outside was the girls' paddling pool set under shady trees.

  My mother could not understand why we had moved to a place with such an intolerable climate. It was either hoar frost or a heatwave and nothing in between. I tried to explain that the six months between their last visit and her current one had been delightful. It wasn't just the weather; she and my father were still unable to comprehend why we had left our 'successful' city life. Sometimes I felt the same way… but I would never have admitted that to my parents. I wanted their unconditional support. Sean found it difficult to share a house with his mother-in-law so we hardly saw him. As it was, before my mother's visit he and I didn't talk much, thanks to him working long hours. After my mother left, our ability to communicate worsened and we both withdrew into our work: house renovations for me and vineyard work for Sean. Nonetheless, I was feeling more relaxed about Sean being out on the tractor and working with farm equipment, although I still felt angst each time he got the trimmer out.

  There was a broken tile and a persistent leak in the winery roof that needed fixing, and since no machinery was involved, I let Sean go up on the roof and passed the required material up to him. A few seconds later he lurched backwards, thrashing a piece of guttering around in the air.

  'Hornets,' he yelled as he fell back, breaking several more tiles. He leapt up again, still whacking violently at the air, and lurched closer to the 4-metre drop.

  'Climb down the ladder! Forget the hornets! Climb down the ladder!' I screamed.

  I couldn't get up in time to do anything so I stood and yelled desperately. At last, he threw the pipe down and climbed down the ladder at high speed.

  'They came out of nowhere,' said Sean, puffing. 'There were a bunch of them zoning in on my neck and face. Then I got stung on the leg. As soon as that fellow got me the rest pulled back.' The sting was already red, swollen and very painful. We were lucky he had only been stung on the leg.