One of the small, local wine domains decided to have an event to show how the grape harvest (vendange) was done in days gone by - this was not a spectator event. We were encouraged to dress appropriately and so we did. The event was scheduled to start at 08.30, so we turned up at 9 (we were caught out before when we went to an olive picking day).
When we arrived, there wasn't much going on, but we wandered around looking at the animals
Preparations where being made for our lunch, was this a friend of the above?
We were almost at the point of going home for a coffee, when people started wandering off to the paddock. Here, horses were being attached to carts and carts assigned to people.
Priority was given to the young and the old, plus those in fancy dress - we were assigned a cart.
Then the procession headed off for the fields. Those who were not lucky enough to get a place in a cart walked along beside the carts. The cart in front of us here has all the crates ready for us to fill.
Our cart was near the front of the procession and behind us we had a horse with a mind of its own. It seemed to want to overtake us and had to be accompanied by his handler at all times.
We were accompanied by men on bikes, who were ready to stop the traffic for us until we reached the side roads. When we reached the vines, the crates were unloaded the horses had a rest.
Now it was our turn to work and pick the grapes
After about an hour, we were finished
The barrels were loaded onto the lead cart and we set off for the centre of the village.
When we got back to the domain, lunch was being prepared.
We enjoyed the rest of the afternoon, eating, drinking and chatting with a group of French and Australians.
Posted with Blogsy