Thursday, September 4, 2008

Leaks are not for the Meek

This evening I was pumping juice into barrels from the first grapes of the season, the Artz Vineyard sauvignon blanc. Because we have very limited space (and no forklift), our barrels are stacked in a traditional diamond pattern, rather than in the more modern (but less space-efficient) way using metal barrel racks. This means that barrels on the bottom of the stack are essentially immovable once the barrels on top of them in the stack are filled. So just as I'm filling the topmost barrel in the stack, I notice a pool of juice forming on the floor. "Oh, crap" I thought (not exactly what I thought, but you get the idea). I grab my flashlight and shine it in between barrels, looking for the leak. Sure enough, it's one of the bottom barrels. The thought of emptying all of those barrels, unstacking and restacking all of the barrels, and starting over with filling makes me feel ill and slightly dizzy. I have to try to plug the leak. Unfortunately, the leak appears to be at the far end of the barrel (I only have access to one end, because there's another stack of barrels right up against the one I'm working with). Leaks like this are not all that uncommon in barrels that have been sitting empty for a few months between being emptied for bottling and refilled after harvest. That's why I had washed and soaked all of these barrels to make sure they were watertight before stacking them. I've never had one leak after being put in the stack, not like this.

Luckily, many leaks are caused by very small holes or cracks, and can be plugged. But I couldn't see the leak from the side I was on. There was only one thing for it: I would have to go in from the other side.

Now, crawling between two barrels at the bottom of a multi-ton barrel stack in a wine cellar rife with spiders (and the occasional mouse) is not for the claustrophobic, but it was the only thing to do. With my mini mag-lite in my mouth and a toothpick in one hand, I wiggled my way in between two barrels on the bottom of the neighboring barrel stack that would give me access to the back end of the leaker, and prayed for all the local seismic faults to remain quiescent for the next few minutes. Just to give you an idea of the size of this space, the stick that I use to space out the barrels is 8 inches long, so that's the distance between the fattest part of the bulges. I'll try to get a photo to show the space I was in. There are no photos of my legs sticking out, because I'm pretty sure Sarah would have had a heart attack if she had seen me doing this. Sure enough, I could see the spot where the juice was leaking out, right along the edge of one of the metal hoops that hold the barrel together. I jammed the toothpick in and waited, shining the flashlight on the spot. Right away the flow stopped. Calooh! Calay! Oh frabjous day!

Just another evening in the life of a winemaker.

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

The Silver Bullet

Sometimes weird things happen with trucks. For example, with the truck that I rented to pick up the first grapes of the season, the sauvignon blanc. It was a pretty smooth trip, no real problems, but there was this noise. Every time I started from a stop, there was a little thunk, like something being moved by the acceleration and hitting something else. It sounded like metal on metal somewhere over my head. I looked everywhere - on the roof of the cab, in the cab, under the seats - nothing. Then, when I took the truck back to the rental place and was making sure I had gotten everything out of the cab, there it was: a can of Coors Light under the seat, in a spot where it could roll back and forth on the floor, hitting the metal bars that kept it from rolling out under my feet. Thunk.....thunk.

"Ah HA!" I thought. The gods have just handed me, at the beginning of Harvest, the beverage that I will use to celebrate the end of Harvest!