How many times have you awoke to find a stray pony in your yard? That happened to us Saturday morning. Below is a picture of Poison Rose standing next to "Seabiscuit". We did track down the owner who offered us this fine animal. I have to discuss it with Minnie the winery pig first but I've always fancied myself as a bit of a cowboy.
When I'm not rangling dogies, mending fences and bustin' broncoes, I enjoy a little hobby called winemaking. This was suppose to be my last week of crush but the weather has been so nice and warm that I decided to let Lemberger hang on the vine a little longer. I like my Lemberger well hung. Employee of the month, runner-up, Ryan and I did manage to crush more Pinot Noir than we've ever done in a single year. That's right. We're amping up our Pinot Noir production and I picked a great year to do it. The fruit was beautiful and I'm sure a lot of Willamette Valley wineries would have killed for it since most of them weren't able to ripen theirs this year. The well-hung Lemberger will come in Monday or Tuesday, then I will be finished with harvest 2007.
Friday night the fam and I headed out to Maryhill Winery for a little going away party for our friend Reuben who has worked for Maryhill the last several harvests. Reuben is a winemaker from Australia who comes out every year for crush. We had a great time and got to hang out with James and Poppie from Syncline, Luke from Cor Cellars and Craig and Vicky from Maryhill. The only thing better than being a cowboy here in the gorge is hanging out with these great people and tasting everyone's great wine. Hurry back, Reuben.
Our library tasting is coming up in a few weeks. This is where we open every vintage of every wine we've ever produced. Dozens and dozens of wines will be available for tasting at this event.
We've never charged for this event but it is limited to you blog readers and wine club/barrel club members. If you would like to attend please email me. I'll make sure Seabiscuit is combed and shoed. Also coming up is our annual Thanksgiving weekend Open House. We will have several new releases, barrel samples, snacks and live music. This has always been one of the most fun weekends of the year here at Wind River Cellars so come early, stay late.
I'll post later in the week. Seabiscuit and I have a rodeo to train for.
It's hard to quit you, Husum!
Joel
