Week Two

So it's the end of my second week at Viticulture school, and I'm already feeling more comfortable with a lot of the terminology and concepts. Now when the teacher talks about Brix, veraison, terroir (tear-wah), vegetative vigor, split canopies, canes, cordons, and shoots, I don't stare at her like she has two heads! Seemed like a short week, but I've learned so much. The lectures are interesting, but not nearly as effective as actually being out in the vineyard, and we had a full day of it today. Walking all the different varietal blocks, observing vines in all stages of development, discussing how to 'train' the vines to different trellis systems, and having a lot of fun learning how to use a refractometer (measures the percentage of sugar in the juice - as the sugar increases, acidity decreases) to sample the grapes' juices to determine when they will be ready for picking - and how that is affected by the style of the wine you want to make. For example, if you want to make a light Rose from the Syrah grapes, you would pick them earlier, and conversely if you wanted to make a big, bold red, you would leave them on the vine weeks longer. Not too complicated!

This evening was another fun night out with my "vacation rental" hosts Chris and Laura Hagar at the Sonoma Wine Club in Sebastopol, where we discovered a wonderful wine to enjoy with dessert - Field Recordings from Koligian Vineyards in Paso Robles (Central Valley) - an interesting and delicious blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Petit Verdot and a couple others I've never heard of! Had to buy a bottle for my 'cellar' at a reasonable $32. We were joined by several of their friends who were out following an evening at their "Science Buzz" Thursday night lecture: retired UC Berkeley Political Science professor, retired Physics professor, and retired mechanical engineer. Lively discussion.

Back to classes next Tuesday.