Start of day two and I got to see the sun rise over the Russian River Valley with the fog nestled in tight, stunning

A trip up to the hilltop vineyard in the afternoon

Juice being drained from the tanks, look closely, that is a gigantic strainer and below is all the juice

Roll up your sleeves, it’s time to work

Look to the back of that tank…there is a lot of pumice to move, about 12 of those bins full

one tank down…they do up to 8 or 10 a day (I can’t recall)

These were grapes, now they will become fertilizer and be tilled back into the soil

Getting dirty

No really, I was getting super dirty

Casey and I finishing up this tank…make sure to check her blog out over at Rooted: You

Can you tell I was proud of myself? I was, I worked on this whole tank from start to finish

All of that dark stuff is the pumice which is brought here to this open field once it’s done at the winery and turned several times a day until it is fertilizer, it is then brought back to the vineyards and worked into the soil

Helping with pump-overs, which literally pumps the juice back over the top of the tank to help reincorporate the skins that have been pushed to the top during fermentation

Filling barrels

there is a lot of science involved…real deal science

Farmer John and his grapes

One of way too many grape arrival photos because I think it is so beautiful

Here they are instantly de-stemmed and sent to their next destination

Last but certainly not least, this is a carnivorous plant that actually traps and kills those mother f*$#&ng fruit flies that dominate all of our kitchens every summer, it is called a capensis plant and I am getting one immediately. I saw it in action, it works!