The Grape Years Weblog

It’s pretty hard not to get into the spirit of the harvest. At the moment my trips back and forth to Beaune usually entail crawling along behind a tractor groaning with baskets of freshly picked grapes. When I drive through Pernand-Vergelesses on the way home, I find the narrow streets clogged with grape pickers, celebrating the end of another day in the vineyards with a glass in their hand and, more often than not, grape leaves festooning their hair.

Even the girls are learning about it in school. Yesterday as I was inching along behind a van filled to the brim with singing vendangeurs I was treated to an exegesis of how wine is made and what an important part the “vendanges” plays in this process from my five and three year old in the backseat.

Franck had been making noises about wanting to get out in the fields too. So when my friend Charlotte (same name as my eldest daughter, which sometimes gets a tad confusing), whose husband Marc-Olivier has just taken over the management of their family’s Domaine in Volnay, mentioned that they often needed extra grape pickers, I offered Franck’s services. Franck was a bit surprised when I returned home and informed him of the fait accompli, but I retorted that after well over a decade of living with me he should know that I’m not very attuned to the whole concept of “hypothetical”.

So on Friday, Franck got suited up in his grungiest work clothes and had his father drive him out to Volnay at the crack of dawn. The weather was beautiful – and dry. This is very much commented on and appreciated as most years the grape harvesters spend their days knee-deep in mud.

At the end of the day, it was a toss up between who had done a favour for whom.

Franck was enthralled about having a day away from his desk, engaged in hard physical activity. Indeed, the Grape Harvest is not for the lazy. Especially in this instance, as Franck was working alongside a team of related Portuguese who have done the “vendanges” at the Buffet Domaine for years and years.

According to Franck, the Portuguese contingent sang and joked and argued their way down the rows of vines, without ever letting up their pace. Perhaps Franck may have some Portuguese blood in there somewhere, as he was able to keep up to them.

When I brought the girls home for lunch that day I explained that their dad was cutting grapes in the vineyards. Between Beaune and our house we would see a team of vendangeurs every twenty meters or so, and every time we did the girls screamed out that they had spotted their father. I tried to explain that there were actually lots of vineyards around here and at the moment lots of Grape Harvesters, and that actually their Daddy was working on the other side of Beaune. It was no good however; they kept spotting him again and again, as though he had been repeatedly cloned.

Meanwhile, Franck was having a fabulous lunch in Volnay. As my friend Charlotte has noted, food is of utmost importance during the vendanges. You serve bad food, and you pretty well guarantee not to see a single one of your Grape Harvesters again the next year. Keep them well fed, and they keep coming back. So to this end, Franck and his teammates feasted on homemade quiches and several huge lasagnes, both of which Franck said were among the best he’d ever tasted.

After picking up the girls from school, we drove to Volnay to pick up Franck. He arrived shortly after us, bumping into the Domaine’s courtyard in a muddy truck with some other vendangeurs. Many of them seemed particularly preoccupied with the question of whether he was coming back the next day…apparently if he wasn’t he was due right then and there for a head scrub with bunches of grapes – the traditional way to send off a departing vendangeur.

Franck assured them that he would indeed be back the next day, although I for one knew we had other plans. I shot him a Look, but he made an infinitesimal gesture for me to keep that tidbit of information to myself.

The plastic cases of grapes were unloaded, and we all tried some. They popped in our mouths with a concentrated flavour of sunshine and sugar and earth. Then the girls watched, fascinated, as the grapes were poured into the wine press.

After some glasses were fetched we tasted the juice. It was delectable – sweet and smooth already. My Charlotte in particular took a liking to it and would have chugged down several glasses if we hadn’t stopped her. Apparently too much can give one a serious case of the collywobbles. She didn’t realize the rarity and value of what she was drinking, but she certainly did recognize that it was good, and, wise child, she wanted more.

Before we left to go home to dinner our friend Charlotte gave us a tour of the caves of the family Domaine, many of which date back to the 17th century. The kids came down with us, including my friend’s tribe of three, and raced around the resting barrels as we toured through the maze of interlinked caves. Just as you thought you’d gotten to the end of it, a little passageway would open up to another section. Charlotte saved the best for last, the family’s private section of the cave where stocks of bottles dating back as far as 1915 were piled up, unlabeled and covered in dust.

We went home that evening, content that, thanks to our friends, in our own little way we too had been involved in the vendanges of 2005. When we finally got the girls to bed and were ensconced in front of the TV, I began to pepper Franck with further questions about his day, but the only answer was a rumbling snore. He was already fast asleep.

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