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Public Zone 公開區 => Travelogues 遊記相薄 => Topic started by: hangchoi on 29 June 2010, 13:26:26
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Another aim for my trip to Canada is to visit the wineries at Okanagan Valley. There are 2 main wine regions in Canada: Okanagan Valley and Niagara Peninsula. This time I went to Kelowna, which is situated in the Central Okanagan region.
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Kelowna is at the Central Okanagan area. This area has been producing wine for more than 140 years (since 1859). The whole area is a valley with mountain surrounding it.
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THE CLIMATE
The climate of Kelowna is said to be continental, as it is in in-land area and surrounded by mountains. However, the Okanagan lake gives the area a moderating effect. Having said that, it has a moderate continental climate which the summer is hot and dry. I have talked to the local people there and they said that there would be forest fire every summer, due to the hot and dry weather. Sounds like in Australia.
However, in 2010, the weather is cold and rainy, forest fire is not an issue too. This may mean that the ripeness of the grape may be a question to the wine maker.
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THE SOILS
Generally the soils are mainly clay and sand.
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The whole region of Okanagan is full of fruit products. In addition to the grape growing, you can find apple, cherry, strawberry, etc. everywhere. This implies that the soil is quite fertile here. As we know that good grapes are usually come from less fertile soils, this may be a reason that they have weeds along the vineyard.
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Since the region is on a valley location, they make the best use of the hill slope to plant their vine to get the maximum sun exposure. The orientation is usually east or west facing.
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We all know that hill slope will provide good drainage to water, which may pose a drought problem in hot and dry summer here. Like most of the new world wine making, irrigation is used. As far as I found on vineyard, they installed fixed sprinkler head for irrigation.
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VITICULTURE
Most young plants were supported by plastic sleeves.
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Pruning and Training
Various pruning and training methods are observed. This first one is Cordon du Royat or single cordon.
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The second one I found is Spur-pruned + VSP.
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The grape varieties they plants have a huge profile. In Kelowna area, they mostly plant white varieties. Chardonnay, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris and Gewruztraminer are quite common for white and Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Syrah may be found. From the tasting point of view, their Pinot Noir and Chardonnay are quite nice.
In addition, they also plant Foch, a hybrid red grape which produces a rather full body red wine with a taste like a blend of syrah, cabernet sauvignon and merlot. For white, Ehrenfelser is planted. This is a crossing of Riesling and Sylvaner and I found that it tasted like an unripe Riesling.
At the time I visited the vineyard, the fruit set was already done.
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VINIFICATION
Like the modern style of wine making, stainless steel vats were used for fermentation. As I cannot get into the winery to see their production, I can only take picture far away.
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MATURATION
Another usually practice here, stainless steel for white and barrel for red. I had talked with a lady of Mission Hill winery. She said that they are using 225 litre barrique of both French and American oak. I went to their cellar but I found most of them were American oak.
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The cork for the barrique is acrylic....
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In total, I had visited 5 wineries. Some of them are quite commercial which gives you free tasting without explanation, while some of the other have wine tour to let you know their wine philosophy. The most valuable thing is that they usually allow you to walk around their vineyard so that I can have more study on their vineyard.
That concludes my visit. At last, I show you a picture of "yeast beads" but you need to watch carefully......
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Good. Thanks for sharing the pictures and stories.
Can you tell the grape type from the look of the vine? Also their vine does not look too old. I am guessing from the thickness of the stem.
Pruning & training means how their cut out the excessive branches to concentrate on the strong ones?
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Can you tell the grape type from the look of the vine? Also their vine does not look too old. I am guessing from the thickness of the stem.
Pruning & training means how their cut out the excessive branches to concentrate on the strong ones?
I would say "NO". You cannot tell the variety by looking to the vine, but some grape varieties do have a different shape of leaves, for example, Cabernet Sauvignon's leaves have a bigger curve on the leaf shape. But most of them don't.
You are partly right on the meaning of pruning and training. Cutting out the excessive branches for concentration is mainly done in summer, so it has a name called "green harvesting" or "summer pruning". Vine-growers also do winter pruning to reduce the branches for preserving the energy and carbohydrate so that the vine has more "food" reserve in winter. Training is the way to regulate the growth of the vine for facilitating the sun exposure, ease of harvesting, etc.
The Cordon du Royat I showed on the picture is to keep the Cordon (the horizontal thick branch) to reserve more carbohydrate, so the winter pruning will cut up to the branch of that cordon.
I have forwarded this link to some of my wine friends. Please correct me if I am wrong..... :D