Harvest 2011: Beauteous Weather, Bountiful Grapes

Okay, it's official. 2011 looks like it will have been a fantastic vintage after all. We got our hopes up in the Spring, they were dashed by a crappy July and they were reignited by exceptionally warm and sunny weather at the beginning of October. Here's the "official" write-up with some additional gory details:The weather had been dry all winter (no snow - whereas normally we get two or three falls), and remained quite dry through Spring and Summer. At the end of May, with such a vigorous start to the growing season, we thought we were headed for an early beginning to the harvest, and moved our expected dates up by three weeks. But the weather was unseasonably cold in July and slowed things down significantly. August was very hot, with fewer summer storms than usual. By late summer, we had lost most of our advance, and by the beginning of September we were back to our average historical ripening patterns, so our harvest started at our usual date, the third week in September, in this case the 22nd. As you know, we are always about 3 weeks later than others in the area because of the altitude. We had exceptionally sunny, hot weather in October, much to the delight of the harvesters, although they were almost uncomfortably hot at certain points and some actually volunteered to come help us on the sorting table in the cool winery, which was a first!In conclusion: the grapes are of an exceptional quality this year, with good deep colour and great red fruit aromas. Phew. Yields are at our average levels. We were concerned that with all the heat and sunshine we might get runaway potential alcohol on the Grenaches but we sped up at the end, and were fine, except on one mini-parcelle of Grenache:  the grapes were so sweet we stopped the fermentation early, kept the residual sugar and made some sweet wine instead. This is definitely a year where the fact of harvesting 3 weeks later than the norm worked in our favor, though it can always go either way.Here's the official 2011 Rhone write up from James Molesworth, the dynamic critic from Wine Spectator, with a quote or two from yours truly.Wine Spectator: 2011 Vintage Report France