Bang to the mouth 2

I forgot to say that on top of everything else we decided to bring our trail hound ben(digo) to this South African house and farm.
So far he likes it. He's made 6 new friends and is the talk of the village. He arrived 2 hours late on Saturday 1^st of November along with my missing guitar.

The trip to pick up the vines was successful – there are now 3000 sticks sleeping overnight in 4 bins of water.
Tomorrow at ¼ to 7 we plant.

Post Post - above is picture taken on the 4th of November: Bendigo helping to plant vines

A bang on the mouth

Today, 3 November 2008, I am going to Voor-Groenberg Nurseries near Wellington to collect 3000 new Viognier vines to plant in the prepared holes in our virgin vineyard. I'm borrowing Steve-n-Jane's Toyota Hilux bakkie and setting off soon via Caledon (to get our mobile 'phone unblocked). I should get back mid afternoon in time for the arrival from England of Val and Al Block. Val & Al are staying for 2 weeks and, as well as being here to witness the planting of the vines, they are also singing with us at the Abbey Rose tomorrow night.

I'd always meant to write a contemporary account of the planning and building of the South African project and of our complex travelling and living arrangements between the Western Cape and West Cumbria. However I'm pretty sure it is almost impossible to devote probably 1 hour a day to the journal whilst doing the project. SOOO…. what I've decided to do is to start now, at the planting milestone, to try my best to write up the vineyard project on a weekly going forward schedule and also try and intersperse the contemporary stuff with a commentary on the past 3 years. I've got notebooks, sketch pads and correspondence going back 10 years so it should be easy. History, as we all know, is only 1 person's interpretation of what actually happened. I'm not going to spend a load of time polishing and 'byuddy shining' it (to quote my 3 year old grand-daughter). I would appreciate though some editorial help from Nick (please?) and Emma (please please?) to keep me within the rules of written English and any possible libel action.

I'm also going to publish to the blog as I go. That way it's out there, not skulking on my hard-drive, and it will encourage me to get the records up to date. Good theory!

The vineyard project started I think in early 2005, though technically it had been brewing (sorry) since we bought a house in Greyton in May 2001 - or maybe 1996 when Di and I first travelled together to SA or maybe when I worked in SA during the 70's and first visited the wine lands. Hell - I don't know.

Anyways – in January 2005 we decided to buy a piece of farm land from Steve and Jane Collins with the intent I seem to remember of creating a wilderness reserve and maybe building a small house once we had sold our place in Greyton and also our share in a café and gallery there. Complicated or what?

The chronology (is there such a word) gets a bit blurred but I think it went:

May 2005 – buy 90 hectares of land from S&J Collins – eventually agree to share it with them – they have South West side we have North East – see Map later.
May 2006 – after a lot of walking round decide on place for the house and start building
July 2006 – Sell Greyton House
December 2006 – sell Café and Gallery
April 2007 - House substantially complete – move in
September 2007 – electricity switched on
October 2007 – retire from paid employment in UK
March April 2008 – rip and prepare the land for planting
May June 2008 – install stainless steel support system to half of vineyard
July August 2008 Install Irrigation system
Aug September 2008 – intend to plant vines – FAIL
November 2008 .. here we go

Looks simple doesn't it – but just wait there's 36 months to account for.
The view this morning