In order to describe a harvest like the one we have just experienced we don’t need a lot of imagination. Results are so promising that surprised us as well. Nature sometimes can be really great and powerful.

Here are some numbers to understand a vintage more special than others:

20.8° is the average temperature of September, while in the past decade it was 18.1°. Climate excursions made this month similar to typical summer ones, with high temperatures between 25 and 30 degrees, and low ones close to 15°.
35 mm is the rain that fell during all the month, while the average of the past decade was about 170 mm.
253 were the hours of sunshine, more than the average of 233, due to the presence of high pressures.
22 were the days of harvest (it started on September, 12th) with sun and fairly good ventilation. During the whole period we had only two days of bad weather.
36 were the people working for the harvest. They were divided in two teams to pick up and select fragrant and full flavoured grapes.
205 are the tonneaus where the important whites are fermentating.
315 are the barriques ready to receive the reds after the first phases in stainless steel tanks, in order to start alcoholic and malolactic fermentation.
820 square meters is the space entirely dedicated to the drying up of grapes meant to produce Tal Lùc.
14% is the average alcohol by volume.

We look at the maturation of these wines with the expectation of a vintage that could achieve very good rankings.

August 2006

Dear friends,

It is years now that in the vineyards we are working for a true, non apparent, quality; the evidence of this is the quality level reached by traditional wines, even in hard vintages like 2002 or 2004. For this reason, in order to guarantee a top level harvest, also this year there is nothing left to fortune…and up to this point premises are from good to very good.
In the meantime, bottling of the top wines of 2005 are proceeding in the cellar: one better than the other, and this is not rhetoric!
After the hottest July of the last 30 years, we are about to face an extremely hot Autumn…
Holidays are still far for us…

Greetings right from the vineyards!
A.P.

Francy for art II edition
June 2006

In San Lorenzo Isontino, at Villa Lis Neris, the second edition of Francy for Art has just finished. This artistic competition, promoted and organized by Francesca Pecorari Onlus, is meant to promote young art students and to make public opinion aware of what are the solidarity initiatives regarding South-Eastern Asia on which the Association has been working on in the past years.
16 works participated to this edition, dedicated to photographic research and to the topic “Person”. These were done by youths under 20 years attending Art schools of Trieste, Gorizia, Udine and Nova Gorica (SLO). Integrated in the exposition were also some photos from students of the Accademia di Belle Arti of Venice, showing a juvenile research evolving right from high schools, to which it can offer the motivation to continue in artistic studies.
To complete the event, for what in concerns both photography and the theme “Person”, some photos from Danilo De Marco were shown. This is a famous artist whose photos show “invisible” people excluded from the well-being society regaining the strong personality that they often can’t possess.

For further info visit www.francy.org

Tal Lùc 2003 - Falstaff February edition
March 2006

In the piece of writing "Italienische Süßweine" from Othmar Kiem 50 wines among the best and most representative sweet Italian wines have been tasted by Fastaff - one of the most important Austrian Wine Magazines, on its February issue.
And the results are really interesting for us:

Tal Lùc is at the top (with 95 marks - II effective position).

Super-Tal Lùc!
A.P.

January 2006

It’s a freezing way to begin a new year!
Since the first days of the month, cold wind currents blowing down in our valley from East- North East are causing very low temperatures, whose effect is intensified by cold winds. And the snow, which makes us visit twice, gave a fabulous touch to the whole scene.
Under these conditions working activity in the vineyards has slowed down, while in the cellar it is very lively.
This is wine’s current situation:

Whites: we are doing battonage operations for wines in steel and in wood (with much more frequency on these).

Reds: malolattic fermentation ended and the wines are now ready for aging in wood.

Drying up grapes: they have nearly reached the sugar’s concentration level we wanted (500/550 g/lt).

A.P.

Traditional propitiatory fires for Epiphany feast
January 2006

According to an ancient Friulian tradition many propitiatory fires (in Friulian language “Pignarui”) are lighted in the night between January, 5th and 6th in order to predict how new year is going to be.
While flames go towards the sky, ancient people state how the new year will be on the basis of the direction of the smoke.
This year the smoke went towards East – South East which means a positive year.

Finger crossed!

A.P.