Saving Our Skins

by Caro Feely

  At the show my first meeting was with the Klurs, winegrowers from Alsace. Francine Klur had sent a circular email looking for partners for an organic wine tourism association, inviting interested parties to meet. The website Klur.net showed a vibrant operation similar to ours in its mix of wine and tourism, but on a larger scale and with about four centuries of winegrowing history.

  Francine's husband Clément was on their stand, a compact, fit man with an infectious broad smile, apple cheeks, curly greying hair that was receding slightly, and a beard; a dead ringer for Bacchus. 'Francine is flying around networking and deal-making,' he said, shaking my hand.

  He offered me a taste of their wine, pouring from a classic tulip-shaped Alsace bottle with a striking modern label. The wine was deep and divine: lime, acacia and a mineral touch like a hint of the sea.

  When Francine arrived she talked fast – with the slightly clipped French accent of Alsace that helped me to keep up – moved fast, and zapped from idea to idea like a cauldron of electricity. With Jean-Jacques Paire, an easy-going winegrower from Beaujolais sporting a cowboy hat, we gathered at a conference table and talked about how we could work together to promote organic wine tourism to the media and to clients, tourism products we could offer across vineyards in the association, and how we could share ideas and information on subjects ranging from regulations in France to ecological packaging.

  Klur was biodynamic, interesting for us as we prepared for biodynamic certification with Demeter, the same organisation they were certified with. Francine was a powerful force with infinite energy and enthusiasm and a deeply rooted organic ethos. Meeting these two inspirational winegrowers alone made the trip a success. But real success would be selling our wine to the buyers who were patrolling the hall.

  Since I wasn't officially presenting I signed up under the name of my tourism website and snuck about to present our wines. I found a few spare glasses and a table in a rest area and organised my space for meetings. Zooming back and forth between this unofficial space and my clandestine cooler box, kindly stored at the stand of a friend, I offered tastes of our precious wines with a glass as spittoon and a surreptitious pitch, one eye on the wine and one eye scanning for show organisers on the hunt for poachers like me.

  Although we had rafts of positive reviews I felt nervous when people tasted our wines. I poured tastes of the whites for one buyer and he tasted, nodded, chucked, and moved quickly on to the next. He barely said a word while I was pouring the three whites. I poured the rosé.

  'There is more work to be done on that. That isn't what the market is looking for in a rosé,' he said disdainfully after spitting.

  'Maybe,' I said. 'Our rosé is always savoury, almost salty, because of our limestone, plus we leave no residual sugar so we can have low sulphites. It isn't your usual semi-sweet or off-dry rosé.'

  He appeared to ignore my comments and I poured the reds and saw him proceed in the same manner as the whites. Given the experience of our meeting so far, perhaps no comment was better. I ended with the Saussignac dessert wine.

  'I like that. The problem is no one buys dessert wine any more,' he said. 'Let's catch up next year.'

  Like hell. I watched him do his rounds and realised his arrogant approach wasn't reserved for me. It was a buyer's market. His attitude made me question again why we should work through the trade.

  The afternoon meetings brought another type of buyer. Mary Pawle was an Irish importer and Ivan, her English husband and collaborator, a professional musician. They were delightful. They tasted through the range asking relevant questions about the vineyard and the winemaking as I poured the different wines. Nearing the end of the tasting I poured the La Source red.

  'It's our last tasting of the day and I'm not spitting this one,' said Mary holding the glass in her hand like a precious baby. 'Don't worry, Mary, I'll get us home,' said Ivan tongue in cheek. We all laughed.

  Seeing how she held the wine, and given the exchange we were having, I knew Mary had respect for the work that went into our products. This was what being in the wine business was about, working hard but also having fun. I felt like I had made two new friends.

  Gabi and I set off in Thierry's red fourgon, the mud-splattered one that Naomi had had the pleasure of experiencing, to explore the city. As I pulled up to the ticket dispenser of a city parking garage, I spotted a sign with a large warning and exclamation mark 'Hauteur maximum: 1.9 m'. I was sure Thierry's van was at least 1.9 metres. It seemed a little late for the warning given there were six cars jammed into the feeder lane behind us. It looked frighteningly close but there was no option but to try. With Gabi guiding, I inched forward, praying that we wouldn't return Thierry a cabriolet.

  The van made it with barely a centimetre to spare. Still mildly worried that there might be a lower section at the exit to the garage we walked into the city. Central Montpellier spread out from the Place de la Comédie, a giant square surrounded by eighteenth-, nineteenth- and twentieth-century buildings. Standing in the luxury of its grand open space in the midst of the city made me feel good; it was like a great lung bringing fresh air. The city was vibrant with students and well-heeled citizens. The old town with tiny cobbled streets hemmed in close by medieval stone buildings reminded me of parts of Barcelona. A charming, dark-haired George Clooney lookalike at the tourist office helped us discover ways to lose ourselves in the city for the afternoon, and we did. Inching out of the exit, we escaped the garage in one piece and made for Thierry's gîte for the biodynamic presentation dinner. The accommodation was in a garrigue landscape, wild herbal scrubland, surrounded by small craggy mountains that reminded me of Montagu, a favourite place in South Africa. As we got out of the van we were engulfed by the dry herby perfume of the Languedoc, the same notes I associated with her wines. Thierry introduced us to the group of winegrowers and we settled in a large dining room in the old stone mas, farmhouse. Pierre-Abel started with a slide showing a mass of stars spread across the heavens. He then went on to talk about how and why the biodynamic calendar worked and about the preparations used in biodynamics. His presentation moved from a snapshot of the history of biodynamics to the theory and on to his practical experience on his own farm down the road from us in Bordeaux. I was riveted. It was so much more than the scientific reductionist agriculture we heard from the likes of the Chamber of Agriculture. It was an agriculture that realised that the farm was a living entity, not a factory. We had already been using herbal cures like the stinging nettle and the willow to combat mildew, a fungal disease; now we were gearing up to do full biodynamics across the whole farm. Reading books was one thing, but real experience was better. The talk left me fizzy with excitement, keen to return to Saussignac to share the insights with Seán.

  Dave Moore 'Mr Greedy', the Yorkshireman on a quest for a wine farm, apprenticed himself to Seán to learn the ropes of pruning for a couple of weeks that winter. Their offer on the vineyard near Saint-Émilion had fallen through, family wrangling over the property having held up progress for a year. In the process Dave and Amanda had learned more than they wanted to about French property transactions but it had given them the time to sell their house in a market that was a little slow. They had now made a new offer on a farm ten minutes from us. It was progressing so well that Amanda joined Dave midway through his two weeks with us, and we accompanied them to translate their negotiations with the seller's agent.

  Chateau Bonté was located on a hill, the courtyard surrounded by stone buildings in need of love. Like Terroir Feely, it looked like it could be a life's work, perhaps even more so.

  'You think you have a problem with your septic tank sloping the wrong way,' said Dave. 'This has no septic tank.' He laughed nervously and pointed out of the window. 'The outpipe sends the waste directly into the field out there.'

  The only toilet on the property was located in the far corner of the large room where we were standing. The room looked like it was used for everything from drying meat to washing clothes.

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sp; But the buildings were beautiful, old and authentic, with original tiles and woodwork that offered enormous potential. Dave's background as a builder was perfect. After looking around the property, we talked through a few final points that needed to be resolved, and we helped to translate where necessary. By the end of our visit all the sticking points in the negotiations were resolved and the purchase was ready to go ahead. Dave was already planning where his new septic tank would go.

  Sophia and Ellie were getting to know Dave and Amanda, seeing them more frequently than they saw our own siblings. Chatting over dinner on the last night of their stay, Amanda told me about the Wine Spirit Education Trust course they had completed a few weeks before. Seán had passed the first three levels when we were in Dublin so I knew a little about it.

  'WSET are looking for people to offer their education programmes, particularly outside the UK. You should think about it, Caro. You're already offering your own wine education.'

  Like our Kiwi friend Kerry Guy's suggestion that we offer the wine classes and tours two years before, Amanda's words sowed a seed. With the debt repayments looming and sales to trade buyers stagnant, we had to find other ways to make money. The wine education and tours almost sold themselves, while selling wine was an uphill battle in spite of excellent reviews.

  Being part of an internationally recognised network of wine schools would be good for credibility and create another revenue stream. But there were some key requirements that we didn't have. First, it was necessary for me to have the WSET qualification, and second, the current tasting room, renovated from a caved-in building soon after we arrived, didn't have a toilet facility and was too small. It could take groups of six but more was a squeeze. I had turned away larger groups for visits the previous year and knew we would have demand if we had a larger space; WSET school or not. A better tasting room would also help sell more wine direct.

  Taking a step towards our plan, Seán set about renovating a low stone building next to the tasting-room terrace to create a facility so that guests didn't have to come into our private house for the toilet. Managing the working, public parts of the farm separately from our private family space was something we needed to learn. Setting the boundaries was up to us.

  With no previous building experience, Seán elevated the stone walls à l'ancienne, raising the building two feet using stones gathered from our fields. Then he constructed the roof and fitted a new door and window in their respective cavities. I was in awe. Seán had transformed from certified financial analyst to winegrower and builder.

  In the intervening years, within a 5-kilometre radius of us, three winegrowers had died, two asphyxiated by carbon dioxide given off by the fermentation process, and one from falling off a vat. Our new life's work was dangerous. Within a 20-kilometre radius, yet more had died in tractor and harvest-machinery accidents. The local strawberry grower, one of my favourite farmers at the Gardonne market, committed suicide. I was filled with a deep sadness; I read that in our modern economy, suicide amongst farmers was double what it was for other occupations. I also felt very frustrated that the accidents were usually the result of fatigue caused by farmers working long hours because they could not afford help. Like the suicide, they were a result of the environment. In modern farming and rural environments, with the scale required and enabled by machinery, there is less community, making it more lonely; and there is more debt because of the capital machinery and equipment required to survive, creating more stress for the farmer. Building work could be dangerous, too. Seán had learned to take care, but I still worried.

  In a forested enclave in the north-east of the Dordogne we bought a composting toilet from an eco-warrior to complete Seán's chef-d'oeuvre. The loo was constructed to separate human waste, thereby making it easier to process in an ecological manner. The urine from this special loo and all the grey water from the shower and basin of the new washroom went into a moveable tank we could use for watering plants. The 'dark matter' fell into another section and, since it was kept dry, it did not smell – much. It had to be removed manually every six months and composted for a long time before it could be used on decorative plants.

  This new contraption was cheaper than installing a septic tank for a 'normal' toilet and gave us the opportunity to test it for potential use in future renovations. At last guests didn't have to trek to our house. In my sign for visitors I included instructions and the amazing facts that the waste was safely composted to be put to good use, and that each visit to this toilet would save 5 to 10 litres of water compared to a normal toilet. The facts were very convincing, but I didn't know if I was up to the challenge of manual removal of the dark matter – only time would tell.

  Seán and I admired the new toilet now installed, then walked out along the small stretch of scrubby grass and rubble between the tasting-room terrace and the cliff down to the limestone amphitheatre. I gazed back onto his renovated building, wedged between the terrace and the stone ruin behind the winery, and was filled with pride. Helen and Derek Melser, a Kiwi couple, had uncovered this area two years before in a Herculean forest clearance that revealed expansive views. At last we were starting to make use of it.

  The vines were hibernating, their forces gathered back into their roots for the dark cold winter. Below us, rows of leafless stumps, some like porcupines with their brown canes pushing up in all directions, others already pruned neatly back to one or two, ran down the hill towards the lower part of the valley, a natural forest scrubland we called 'Where the Wild Things Are'. At night the sounds reminded me of Africa, with hooting

  owls, barking deer and many others that we couldn't identify. We made our way back from the ruin to the tasting-room terrace.

  'But even with the new toilet we still don't meet the requirements for the wine school,' I said.

  'How come?' said Seán.

  'The room has to be large enough to sit people double-spaced for the exams, and it has to have an anteroom attached,' I said.

  'Hmm.'

  'I always wanted Helen and Derek's ruin to be a second gîte, so we can't put it there,' I said.

  'Maybe we should make the tasting-room terrace into the wine school,' said Seán.

  We stepped onto the terrace and I looked out. The views were almost as good as they were from the ruin. 'That's a good idea,' I said.

  'But we have to renovate the ruin into an ecological gîte at the same time. We can't do it later as the access will be blocked by the new tasting room.'

  'That will cost a fortune,' I said.

  'But it will also make good revenue. We have to cost it to know,' said Seán pulling me towards him and giving me a hug. We stood for a moment and looked out at the vines together, feeling that this could be the start of an exciting new step in our adventure.

  Armed with broad estimates from a few local artisans, I created a spreadsheet. It revealed that with the second accommodation unit, and more visits and sales from a new tasting room, we could turn the corner. We might just say goodbye to the knot of financial angst that had been a companion since arriving in France almost four years before. The ideas took form in our minds: a lodge within the stone walls of the barn ruin and a new tasting room backing on to the current one and taking the place of the terrace. The two ideas burgeoned like two leaf buds at the top of a rooted seed. It sounded like nirvana, but it was hard to see how the two buildings would be financed.

  Setting aside that problem, I looked into getting my WSET qualification for the wine school. Some study followed by an intensive course and exam – if I passed – combined with the wine educator course would qualify us to offer the courses that made up the first two levels for WSET. I made an inquiry about availability for the end of the year.

  Seán's new tractor arrived. Along with a significant outflow of cash, its arrival meant we could plant the acre of cabernet sauvignon in the old peach field. We had money to make the first payment on the tractor and the deposit on the new vineyard plantation, thereafter was a hole that led to r
ed.

  Farmed organically and biodynamically, our new vines could live for a hundred years. They could be there for our great-grandchildren. We needed to be sure we were choosing the right thing. Vines, like many fruit trees, are grafted, and the specific fruit varietal you want is implanted into the ideal root for your soil, a different strain of the same family of plant. When choosing vines, the winegrower must select the specific clone – or pre-clone cutting, as we would discover – of the varietal, the specific rootstock necessary, and the nursery to supply it. Cécile, the vineyard advisor who had helped us survive our first few years, stopped by to talk us through the options. She was supportive and friendly, and had dark curly hair and bright eyes. We sat down together at the old pine table in the kitchen, the heart of our house, where all our key discussions seemed to take place. 'You see, Seán, Caro, you need to look carefully at the qualities, the pros and cons for each of the clones available for the varietal you want,' said Cécile. 'Are you sure you want cabernet sauvignon? Perhaps you should consider cabernet franc?'