# Making My Way To The Mecca!



## ibglowin (Oct 22, 2011)

Heading out bright and early tomorrow morning. Got the truck just about packed. Driving down to SA to spend a few days with family and friends then on Thursday its head North to Big D where George has 700lbs of CA grapes for me arriving on Friday morning. Lets hope they are not moldy after this crazy harvest of 2011 in CA.



Getting:



200lbs Cab Suav

200lbs Merlot

100lbs Petit Verdot

100lbs Cab Franc

100lbs Malbec



Whoo Hoo!



I will be sure and take some pics at the Toystore!


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## rhoffart (Oct 22, 2011)

good luck, have a safe trip. Take lots of pictures


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## ibglowin (Oct 22, 2011)

Are you around this week for a "meet and greet"?


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## rhoffart (Oct 22, 2011)

How much finished wine will that be?

If you don't mind, How much was Georges grapes?


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## rhoffart (Oct 22, 2011)

ibglowin said:


> Are you around this week for a "meet and greet"?



Next weekend? Or tomorrow?

I guess I need to read ... sure I'll email you my #


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## ibglowin (Oct 22, 2011)

Somewhere around 45G after all is said and done. This is going to be my red wine production till crush next year.

The prices varied by varietal seems like it averaged ~$1.15 with the discounts. I paid $0.70 a pound last year for grapes from down South in Deming. I sure wish I could stop the truck on I-40 heading East in ABQ! Would save me quite a drive....








rhoffart said:


> How much finished wine will that be?
> 
> If you don't mind, How much was Georges grapes?


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## tonyt (Oct 22, 2011)

Mike, have a great trip. When I was in Dallas this past summer and went by FVW you guys got on me for not posting pictures of George, Joseph and the rest. So word to the wise . . . PICTURES.


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## ibglowin (Oct 23, 2011)

I am taking pics, 720p HD movies for You Tube,Your gonna feel like you are in a virtual tour of the Winemakers Toy Store for sure!


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## AlFulchino (Oct 23, 2011)

i made a post here last evening...and it doesnt show today...

have a great time, say hello to george for me.....w all those grapes your barrels are going to be active!

are you blending w these grapes?


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## Randoneur (Oct 23, 2011)

So, is this the end of kits for you?


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## ibglowin (Oct 24, 2011)

Thinking about picking up a new one of the 40L Vadai's. I thnk I can rotate the Cab and Merlot through the first year and keep it full until next fall. Help me dear lord baby Jesus! 

I will ferment and bulk age separately and then be blending into several Bordeaux type blends down the road.







Al Fulchino said:


> w all those grapes your barrels are going to be active!are you blending w these grapes?


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## ibglowin (Oct 24, 2011)

Will be phasing out the red kits and going with all fresh grapes for reds with only an occasional Limited Release kit or so to fill in as needed to keep the barrels full and going.

Will still make whites from high end kits though.

Hard to compete with 100lbs of grape skins on 6G of wine made from fresh grapes vs maybe 2lbs of grape skins in a grape pack!




randoneur said:


> So, is this the end of kits for you?


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## rhoffart (Oct 27, 2011)

Are you there? Any update on the time? I am heading out at 6am should be there around 10ish.


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## ibglowin (Oct 27, 2011)

Yea, they are not coming in until Saturday! Don't drive up till then! 



rhoffart said:


> Are you there? Any update on the time? I am heading out at 6am should be there around 10ish.


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## Robert123Carr (Oct 27, 2011)

rhoffart said:


> Are you there? Any update on the time? I am heading out at 6am should be there around 10ish.


 Rick where are you coming in from? I will be coming in from Houston.


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## rhoffart (Oct 27, 2011)

RobertCarr said:


> rhoffart said:
> 
> 
> > Are you there? Any update on the time? I am heading out at 6am should be there around 10ish.
> ...



Boerne ... just got an update from Mike, no truck till Saturday. Oh, I guess I should read before posting


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## ibglowin (Oct 28, 2011)

As that old Country & Western song from long ago goes.......

"Here I am in Dallas, where the Hell are you!


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## tonyt (Oct 28, 2011)

Tell George &amp; Joseph, Tony said Howdy!


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## rhoffart (Oct 28, 2011)

ibglowin said:


> As that old Country &amp; Western song from long ago goes.......
> 
> "Here I am in Dallas, where the Hell are you!


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## ibglowin (Oct 28, 2011)

Made our way over to the Toy Store today to see about the grape arrival time and take a look around the place. We just missed George so hopefully will see him tomorrow but did get to meet Joseph and introduce myself. Have to say the Toy Store is by far and away the BEST stocked Home Brew Store I have ever been in (and I have been into many!).

Here are some pics I took. Sorry some are tad bit blurry, taken with the cell phone.



Enjoy!


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## tonyt (Oct 28, 2011)

Good job Mike. George could take inventory from your pcitures. Where's Joseph?


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## ibglowin (Oct 28, 2011)

That's him behind the counter.


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## rhoffart (Oct 28, 2011)

Where are the grapes in the pictures?  JK


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## ibglowin (Oct 28, 2011)

Here they come......


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## rhoffart (Oct 28, 2011)

Cool you went to get them ... thanks


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## TomK-B (Oct 28, 2011)

Love the pics, Mike! I'm hoping to visit "the Mecca" at Christmas. 

By the way, that highway looks way too hilly to be around my hometown.


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## Wade E (Oct 29, 2011)

Nice pics Mike. How many days did it take for that WMTS tour? LOL


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## ibglowin (Oct 29, 2011)

Man, this has not gone as originally planned. We are traveling with our 85lb Golden Retriever as well as a bunch of empty Brute trashcans in the back of an Expedition. Truck was supposed to be here yesterday and we would be home by now. Now the truck won't arrive till 3:00PM today (est) and that means home around 2-3AM. Guess the grapes will be happy in the back in the cool dark of the night on the drive home. 

We found an unbelievable dog friendly hotel here in Dallas thanks to SWMBO who is the absolute internet goddess of finding deals online. We are staying at the Palomar Hotel in big D. Nice place to say the least and highly recommended if traveling with pets (or not) and the room rate wasn't too bad considering they didn't charge for the dog. Some places wanted as much as $100 a night more for a pet. I feel out of place in my truck for sure but they love pets and no extra charge for them. 

Jack is the best car dog in the world. Just chills and sleeps the whole way, gets excited when we stop and he faithfully does his bidness and gets his reward (cookie). We took him to to a nearby lake here in town yesterday (White Rock Lake) and he had a great time at the dog park and walking around the lake. We went out to Costco yesterday after visiting the toystore and found some shade to park in. SWMBO picked up a new Samsung Galaxy II s Android phone and she has been trying to figure out how to run the thing all last night while we watched the ballgame. 

Not a bad trip all in all. Now if we can just get some gosh darn grapes!


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## rhoffart (Oct 29, 2011)

Now no grapes till at least 8pm. I feel for you Mike, I decided to travel at night. I hope to have the grapes on my truck by 10pm. That will put me back home by 2 - 2:30am. 

If you drive home you will be driving all night.


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## ibglowin (Oct 29, 2011)

We are hanging out killing time till tonight. Went back to the lake and dog park just now. Will drive as far as we can tonight and if we can't make it home we will get a room somewhere down the road. Grapes will be fine in the back of the truck for the night. Situation now FUBAR but what can you do.....


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## AlFulchino (Oct 29, 2011)

did i miss something mr photog? no pic of you actually in there...did you have these emailed to you? get back in there and take a pic of you all together w big smiles


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## Wade E (Oct 29, 2011)

I agree, no pics of you actually there means 1 of your friends must have done this. That or only Georges word and from what you said he wasnt there!!! LOL


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## AlFulchino (Oct 29, 2011)

Wade, he did this once before when he said he was swimming in the Carribean


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## Wade E (Oct 29, 2011)

Oh yeah, he showed that hot chic from the post card and Photoshopped it in. Now I remember.


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## ibglowin (Oct 29, 2011)

Day 3

The grape hostage crisis continues.......

The truck didn't show at 8:00 and at last check in was still 300 miles away from Dallas. The natives are getting restless and I feel a mutiny is close at hand......

I fear for the safety of the ships captain and crew.

Another night in another hotel in Dallas.......

We try again to take the grapes by storm in the morning.

If the truck shows.........


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## Robert123Carr (Oct 30, 2011)

Got my grapes and back home at 6am Sunday. What a day, in 2 years I will know if it was worth it!


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## ibglowin (Oct 30, 2011)

That's great news Robert! So glad to hear the truck has arrived and we will finally get home tonight. It was great to meet you as well!


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## Bartman (Oct 30, 2011)

I have returned triumphantly to my home with my 12 gallons of wine-to-be. 'Course, I only had to drive 15 minutes back form George's shop. I didn't have as far to travel, but it still made for some frustrating weekend-activity-scheduling. From delivery scheduled for 9 am Friday (that's when FVW would open for pick-up) to Sunday at 1 am, the truck must have gotten lost along the way



. The white grapes I saw looked a little worse for wear, as if they had been harvested a couple weeks ago (which I guess they were), but the red grapes all looked pretty good - not too big and not much raisining. 

On George's recommendation, I'm using Bourgovin RC 212 for both blends I'm making: Old Vine Zinfandel (2/3) with Pinot Noir (1/3), and Sangiovese (2/3) with Barbera (1/3). pH was 3.58 for the Zin/Pinot Noir and 3.79 for the Sangiovese/Barbera.


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## Robert123Carr (Oct 30, 2011)

ibglowin said:


> That's great news Robert! So glad to hear the truck has arrived and we will finally get home tonight. It was great to meet you as well!


 It was great to meet you also. It was a quite an experience, picking up grapes at 2 o'clock in the am, but it was neat to meet and talk to everyone.


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## rhoffart (Oct 30, 2011)

Well you beat me home by an hour. The truck pull in at 1:00am and I was on the road with 30 gallons of must by 2:10am. I pulled into my driveway at 6:55am. 

I tested and made my first adjustment this afternoon. Here are the numbers

Merlot

3.66 ph
Brix 24.2
SG 1.106
TA 0.310
TA 0.337
Added 60 grams Tartaric acid - 1/2 of what is needed




Cab

3.85 ph
Brix 24.5
SG 1.106
TA 0.322
TA 0.315
Added 60 grams Tartaric acid - 1/2 of what I showed needed

I did two TA tests, that is why there is two numbers


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## Pablo (Nov 2, 2011)

I picked up fresh grapes on Sunday too. I believe I was there when you were there Bart. My grapes were right in front of yours. Barbera will be good. Merlot was not much liquid. We'll see how they come out.


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## Bartman (Nov 2, 2011)

3 days into active fermentation, and it smells good in my house!

I didn't adjust my grapes at all (pH and brix were both ok, I didn't have time, equipment or desire to check the acid level, as I will wait until it's aging to adjust if necessary), and things are moving along nicely. This morning, my daughter asked if it was raining outside because she heard the popping of the fermenting juice. She was really interested in watching me put my arm up to my elbow into the 4 buckets of grapes/juice I have going, to punch down the cap. Still picking out some stems, but now there are a lot more seeds than anything else to avoid.


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## rhoffart (Nov 2, 2011)

Here are a few pictures.


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## Scott (Nov 3, 2011)

Oh my you weren't kidding when you call this heading to Mecca!


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## Bartman (Nov 3, 2011)

I must say, George and Joseph looked rather exhausted by the middle of the afternoon, when my family and I were there. They had already been up much of the night, and this was Sunday! But that's life in "Mecca", once a year at least.

On the other hand, my 8-year-old and I were waiting a few minutes for George to print out our receipt of the grapes I had ordered to get them processed. After we looked around the store and had a seat for a few minutes, she said, I'm glad you like to make wine as a hobby, 'cuz a lot of other Dads just like to watch sports, and that's boring. Making grapes into wine is a lot more interesting."





Note that this is about 2:00 pm on Sunday. In October. In Dallas. (Can anyone say "How 'bout them Cowboys?!"). So you know what I and other folks picking up grapes were missing.

Later, my wife pointed out that the Cowboys game that Sunday wasn't played in the afternoon, it was a Sunday night game. My daughter didn't know that, though. What's sadder though, is I didn't realize it until later either


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## OilnH2O (Nov 3, 2011)

My junior-high son took a lot greater interest in chemistry when I included him in the wine-making aspects, too(see http://forum.finevinewines.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=1515&amp;title=missoula-vinyard ). Except bottle-washing!


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## rhoffart (Nov 3, 2011)

[ame="http://youtu.be/l37TvFbL8M4"]My Cap Punch[/ame]


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## Wayne1 (Nov 4, 2011)

I have been feeling sorry for myself that I wasn't close enough to order grapes - your all's adventures in getting them have made me feel slightly better!


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## ibglowin (Nov 10, 2011)

Pudding meet Proof!








Al Fulchino said:


> did i miss something mr photog? no pic of you actually in there...did you have these emailed to you? get back in there and take a pic of you all together w big smiles


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## tonyt (Nov 10, 2011)

Wow Mike, you're just as good a Photoshop as you are at winemaking. Uh, you really don't look like had been up 47 hours waiting on the truck.


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## ibglowin (Nov 10, 2011)

Ha! That was taken on Saturday afternoon long before the truck arrived the next morning. We left around 8:00 that evening and got a room in a hotel down the road while George and Joseph et al minded the store!


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## Wade E (Nov 10, 2011)

Alright, we'll let you slide this time!!! Great pic Mike!


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