Even though I panicked last week when I received the email notification of the proposed quarry installation, this week has been full of research and helpful advice from friends.
Here’s the long summary of the quarry project. I still haven’t read the whole technical report, but all in good time.
So here’s all the good news:
The short notice (I received an email Friday night asking for a response by Monday) was for a consultation on the quarry’s effects on viticulture. There is over one month to study the project and talk about it during an “enquete publique” that will start next week.
This should be an installation of the least invasive type of quarry. They can dig the big hole and draw stone, but that’s pretty much it. There is no permission to dewater or treat the concrete on site. My two greatest fears.
The project has shrunk from its original size to avoid digging near the most important part of the Fresquel river’s flood zone.
The increased road traffic through Villemoustaussou shouldn’t be too noticable since the current quarry’s traffic also drives through Villemoustaussou. I didn’t even know this so, if it’s true, it means the road traffic is pretty negligible.
The dust clouds should be extremely limited to the area directly around the quarry, and they are watering the roads so even that shouldn’t be significant.
Noise pollution is neglible as I am more than a few kilometers uphill from the project.
At the end of the quarry’s 12 year run, they will apparently turn it into a nice lake which should increase local property value and means more development/funding for Villemoustaussou
The company will conduct a new field study to inventory and catalogue all plant and animal species in the 28 hectares affected to ensure that no protected animals or plants will be displaced or harmed by the project.
I still need to attend the local meetings and read the full file. But it would seem that everything is actually okay and we can turn off the alarm bells for now.
I’m trying to find the study about the project. The DREAL office that conducted the preliminary studies is out of the office this week so I can’t get in touch with them until after the deadline for reading it. There is a physical copy of the 300 page dossier in a box in the Chambre of Agriculture. which I can view up until tomorrow. But I haven’t had a chance yet.
The Chamber of Agriculture assured me that if this were a risky operation, the DREAL would have said so. So they insist that there are no worries. We’re also in a preliminary consultation phase. The actual enquete publique for the quarry project is from June 7 to July 7. Currently, the ODG Cabardes is being sent this information just so we can give a viticultural assessment of the project. So it’s actually a courtesy call and I do have a lot more time than I originally thought. We only have a few days to contribute information about how the project may affect the Cabardes appellation, but we’ll have lots of time to talk about the project in June when everybody has a chance to learn about it.
The project is located much closer to Rivals, another Cabardes producer. I haven’t gotten in touch with Rivals yet but other Cabardes producers alluded to the fact that they might actually be happy about the quarry. Typically, after 12 years the quarry will be filled with water and turned into a pretty lake that can increase property value and also serve as a water reserve to irrigate nearby crops. I don’t have any details about how the quarry will be used after the 12 years, but we’ll probably see more information soon. The other producers concerned are the new owners of Domaine La Mijeanne. The truck route looks like it goes right by them. But I don’t know how much that affects the viticulture. It’s more of a general environmental issue, and that’s not what we’re being consulted about. A neighbor of mine notes that La Mijeanne, under its previous ownership, successfully fought the installation of a different type of project near their domaine on the grounds that there were environmental issues. But that was a much more harmful project where materials were treated on site.
I’ve talked to a couple people familiar with quarry projects and they seem to think this current Villemoustaussou quarry project is a very safe installation. It’s basically a gigantic hole where they’ll get sand and gravel. The materials will be processed elsewhere (in Valmy) and those installations can have a much more significant impact on the environs. The Villemoustaussou installation will not be like this. Apparently, there will be no dewatering or any kind of pumps. All this to be confirmed, but sounds like good news so far.
Last Friday evening, I received an alarming email about the installation of a quarry several kilometers away from O’Vineyards. The email said I had until Monday to respond.
The avis addresses environmental concerns for the surrounding area of Villemoustaussou and concludes that everything seems to be taken into account. With a few further precautions, they say the project should be allowed to continue.
Environmental risks outlined in avis
The biggest issues are the usual impacts of quarries (?!), noise pollution for the direct neighborhood, traffic from the trucks and impact of that traffic on the countryside, to which we can add (due to the location of the project),
the risk of erosion due to the drainage of heavy rain waters or from the upper water table, because the project is located in the alluvial plain of the Fresquel, in a floodzone
the potential impact on biodiversity since the project is located in a classified environmental area
Excuse the poorly translated legalese. This is the best I can do.
Mitigating Factors
The avis goes on to explain that most of this has been taken into account.
Taking into account the extreme proximity of the nearest households (40 meters from the project) and the proximity of the Agglomeration de Carcassonne (400 meters) the project will use merlons (pretty stone/dirt walls) to reduce the impact on neighbors, special trucking routes to reduce danger, and watered roads to avoid dust clouds.
A study of the mobility of the Fresquel river has moved us to reduce the size of the quarry installation; the current project does not infringe on the area that the Fresquel might move to. Furthermore, the site will not need a water waste plan because the materials will not be processed on site but will instead be trucked to an already permitted site to be processed.
Despite the fact that all alluvial quarries in alluvial water tables have an impact on the draw and quality of the aquifer, this impact will be limited by the weak hydraulic gradient that exists and the absence of dewatering pumps
If the 2008 study of the local flora didn’t take into account the protected nature of the zone, the flora inventory executed between 2008 and 2010 is based on field inventories executed during favorable periods like Spring and Summer, which allows us to conclude that the study is globally adapted to the purpose of evaluating the project’s impact on biodiversity. None the less, certain doubts persist after reading the dossier concerning the risk of destroying protected species that require an adaptation of the project to prevent impacting them.
Having read the report, I see that there are houses less than 50 meters away from the site. I imagine that the dust and noise aren’t a big deal or they would be clamoring. However now that I’m researching concrete production and quarries, I’m getting worried about the water table!
The good news is that this is not a concrete processing plant or manufacture or whatever you call it. They take the stone and materials here and drive them to Valmy where they are already allowed to process the stuff. The bad news is that it can still cause fluctuations in the flow of the alluvial aquifer.
This whole project is a few kilometers downhill from me. Does a change in the aquifer draw down there mean that the water table higher up will drain faster or slower? Or will I be unaffected?
I don’t know enough about geology and rainfall to know how that affects the vineyard. I’ll continue looking into it. I guess I have like one day left to research.
I got an alarming email about a quarry project in the town where I make my wine. It’s very short notice! I have to respond by Monday and I don’t know anything about this project.
I got this email from the person at the Chamber of Agriculture who has been acting as a general manager for the Appellation Cabardes for the past couple of years. Basically, it would seem that somebody is asking to create a quarry in the south of Villemoustaussou, the town where I make my wine. It’s specifically a “carrieres de tout venant alluvionnaire” but I have no idea what that means. A quarry where anybody can come and pick up alluvial deposits? The details of the quarry project are 300 pages long and aren’t included in the email. Instead, there is a short summary of this proposed project and a map of its location attached to the email.
The project is on the opposite side of Villemoustaussou from my vineyard. But I’m still concerned. What does it mean for my vineyard? What can I do? Why do I only have three days to respond to this email?! Why did they wait til Friday afternoon (after my lawyer clocks out for the weekend)?
Here’s the email I received at 6:52 PM:
Bonsoir ,
L’INAO nous a transmis dans le courant de la semaine un dossier de projet de carrière(cf principales caractéristiques en pj)sur la commune de Villemoustaussou. Comme d’habitude il y urgence car il faut rendre une réponse écrite avant le lundi 6 juin donc pratiquement avant le vendredi 3 juin( L’ODG est organisme consultatif.)
Avec Robert Gianesini nous pensions organiser dans l’urgence une réunion lundi soir mais faute de salles disponibles, cela ne sera pas possible.
Je vous propose donc de prendre connaissance des 2 documents qui sont un résumé très condensé du projet qui comporte 5 rapports soit 300 pages et de transmettre à Robert et à moi-même votre avis par mail avant lundi 30/05 14H afin de rédiger un courrier officiel de l’ODG.
I’m so confused. How will this affect the environment around my vineyard? Will we all be consumed in a cloud of dust for twelve years? Or will this have virtually no effect on my vines? How will it affect Brau and Donjon who grow their grapes slightly closer to the affected area?
These are the two documents attached to the email:
What on earth am I supposed to do? I don’t have the 300 page document from the INAO detailing the project. I don’t know any of the consequences of this type of project. I don’t know what I’m supposed to say. I only hope that the winemakers more closely affected by this project will see this email before Monday and know better how to respond.
“Même si on est un peu Américain en cave, on est très Français dans la vigne.”
While I was in London for the Languedoc OutsidersTasting, I got interviewed by Marie Lahetjuzan with French Radio London. It was a very fun interview at the end of a long day of tasting and you all know how I can get chatty (especially in front of a charming girl). So they did a marvelous job of editing me down to fit into the time slot of her chronique on gastronomie, “A Table”.
If you understand French, then you can enjoy this mp3 of me stumbling through the interview that aired a couple times last week.
My UK importer Naked Wines just celebrated its second birthday. And like all good business relationships, I feel like any cause for them to celebrate is a cause for me to celebrate as well. They’ve come very far in 2 years, and it seems like they have a lot farther to go. The Naked Wines team announces that they’ll be able to invest £10million in 2011 – a 50% increase on 2010’s investment fund. The rate at which the business has grown is really outstanding and I’m really happy to have gotten on board when I did.
For those who don’t know, Naked has subscribed customers that basically agree to buy a certain amount of wine each year. This gives naked a big investment pot that it uses to support indie winemakers like me. We turn around and offer preferential pricing to Naked and they pass that on to their customers and it’s a big happy family. The site has a lot of other features including the ability to finance a cuvee of wine… and the site also has an indepth social network where customers rate wines and get feedback about what wines they might like or dislike… It’s a pretty sweet set up.
And I just found out at Le Vin 2.0 that I was included in a nice write-up about Naked. Evelyne Resnick (who was mentioned on this blog recently) interviewed me about my experience with Naked. I was pleasantly surprised that she included so much of my testimony in her article. I guess this is why I’m so happy for Naked on its second birthday. I’m hitched to that rising star!!
I get to sell my wine to people I like, I get to know the folks drinking the wine in the UK, I get paid in a timely manner (something that wine importers are not generally famous for), and I get free press just for standing by their side. 😀 Not a bad deal.
“Même son de cloche du coté des producteurs. Ryan O’Connell est un jeune Américain qui s’est installé en Languedoc en 2004 pour faire ‘des vins déliceux, délicieux’ confie-t-il avec un grand sourire. Ryan est le parfait produit d’une double culture : une grande ouverture d’esprit liée à ses origines américaines, et un profond attachement à ce terroir languedocien dont il veut exprimer la quintessence dans ses vins.”
–Evelyne Resnick
The article goes on to describe my relationship with Naked and how it’s a perfect fit. And I have to agree!! 🙂
It has recently come to my attention that a lot of Japanese people are talking about my wine without popping into my google alerts. It’s probably related to the differences in language. Even though they usually write the brand in roman characters, there are often kanji suffixes or other weird linguistic quirks (e.g. o’vineyardsは).
Anyway, I did some active searching and found a lot of people talking about the wines. A few highlights:
A little tweeted tasting note. I’m ridiculously fascinated by reviews I cannot read. Google translate’s best effort approximates the review to “good easily”. Love it. Love that people are out there tasting the Mediterranean Mojo 2006.
And then there’s e-American. An online shopping site that offers deals on my Mojo.
But the big player online is Rakuten who are an enormous online retailer. They bought out PriceMinister earlier this year. And they put together this amazing banner that shows the Japanese are as enchanted as we are with the medieval Cité de Carcassonne.
Inspired by some of my favorite musicians who often favored rural village tours over big city stages, we hit the road in rural England. And I think it was a huge success. Our UK Villages Tour was short but awesome. It’s definitely a concept I want to pursue further!
What is the UK Villages Tour?
We used my importer’s website to find people that were organizing rural wine tastings in the UK, and I offered to show up in person. This year was a quick trial run, and it went really well. We spotted two tastings happening the same week in Oxfordshire and Cumbria and all I had to do was hop over on a RyanAir flight from Carcassonne to Stanstead.
These were tastings where the organizers had pooled money from the group and bought a large quantity of wine from Naked Wines already. Compare that to other tastings where it is often up to the winemaker to furnish the wine, the structure, the organization, etc. On the Villages Tour, people are already paying for wine and they are really appreciative that you’re coming, so they put up room and board and travel.
How did it go?
It went very very well. But don’t take my word for it.
“Thanks for organizing such a good evening on Wednesday – he’s quite a character! I thought the wines were, overall, the best selection we have enjoyed at any of the Club’s meetings. It was a thoroughly enjoyable evening.”
“Last Wednesday’s club meeting was absolutely wonderful and Ryan was a very informative speaker. I learnt a lot more about wine making and had a very enjoyable evening. The wines were excellent, and not one that I was displeased with. Thank you for organizing it and a thank you to Ryan.”
“It was a great night! Ryan was not only knowledgeable and passionate, but very engaging and not too heavy for a Wednesday evening. His humour and humorous approach to his tasting notes and his anecdotal style were an ideal combination. Some of the wines too are definitely worth a bottle or several”
One of my favorite reviews came from a customer who wasn’t totally converted on our wines. You have to realize I’m one of the most expensive wines on Naked, and people really need a good reason to spend an extra 3 or 5 quid on a bottle of wine. It has to be really special. Well, one of the Angels had tasted our wine on its own and he only liked it as much as his other favorites on the site (which are less costly). But our tasting on Lake Windemere allowed him to taste some of his favorites side by side with my wines. And he had one of those aha moments! There’s something to those O’Vineyards wines that makes them just a little different than the new world fruit bombs. There’s something to it! Hard to pinpoint! Well, it was a very nice comment.
Why only 2 stops?
Because that’s all that we found. I tried to do a thing near Edinburgh but it didn’t work out. Most likely because it wasn’t a Naked Wines customer and thus much harder to communicate and motivate. The Angels at Naked Wines are the best. I hope next year we can line up 3 or 4 village tastings. Make it a more legit tour. If you think you can get some people together for a wine tasting next year, let me know! I’d love to explore more of rural England.
Will I do it again?
Yes. On the one hand, I had a lot of fun. Lake Windemere was gorgeous. A geology that, in some ways, reminds me of the south of France. But with a lot more grass and sheep. Presumably, way more rain too, but we had considerably sunny days. The beer was also delicious. Great pubs. Cool experience. Good company. Upton, the village in Oxfordshire, was also beautiful and the group of 40+ people at the village tasting had a lot of fun going through my wines and a couple wines from Benjamin Darnault. I also got to spend a day in Oxford, checked out some of the sights and popped into the Ashmolean. A big thanks to Ivy and Doug for being such wonderful hosts in the Lake District. And a big thanks to my hosts and chauffeurs, Frankie and Kevin Jacklin, who made the whole trip a delight. So I would absolutely do this again because it was a lot of fun.
It also doesn’t hurt to mention the spike in sales on Naked Wines. Naked ran a promotion on a mixed case of my wines right before I came to the UK, selling 50 cases of 6 bottles at a discounted rate. And on top of those 300 bottles, Naked sold another 1600£ of my wines at full price this month. They have some pretty intense cashback offers, so it’s hard to pin down an exact number of pounds that changed hands, but the point is that this vacation of mine was very interesting financially. And my Reserve which comes in at a whopping 30.99£ on the site is rated a 4.8/5 That’s a big deal for this customer base that is VERY value-conscious and very demanding at higher prices.
There’s also talk of the Upton Village Club taking a big trip to my vineyard one day! That could be a lot of fun too!
For now I’ll talk about the Languedoc Outsiders. Updates on the Naked Wine Villages Tour will come later.
The Languedoc Outsiders tasting took place at the Maison du Languedoc Roussillon on Cavendish Square where Louise Hurren united 12 winemakers from all walks of life who have come to the Languedoc Roussillon to make wine with a different perspective. The event went very well with something like 70 tasters over the course of the day. They were all engaged, enthusiastic and appreciative. And when I ran around at the end of the day to taste the wines myself, I understood why everybody had so much fun. Killer wines. Very happy with the whole event. Can’t wait for a version in the Languedoc!
Here is some of the press coverage O’Vineyards received from the Outsiders event so far:
Harpers:
“Each producer has its own interesting story to tell about how they came to the south of France — and having them all under one roof proved an inspirational way to demonstrate that good winemaking is an achievable feat for anyone, anywhere and at any time in their lives.”
“O’Vineyards Proprietor’s Reserve: A blend of Old World and Californian styles, it has a nose of damson and deep-red fruits, with a hint of orange and cloves. The palate is juicy and dry, well-balanced with good length and a bright future. O’Vineyards wine is made by 20-something American Ryan O’Connell who came to Carcassonne in 2005 and is founder of blogging site love-that-languedoc.com”
“Ryan O’Connell, his American father Joe and French/Vietnamese mother Liz arrived France in 2005, having traded the family business building luxury homes in Florida for a more rural existence making wine in the Cabardès region. Ryan is full of infectious enthusiasm and, as well as making some very good wines, works tirelessly in promoting the wines of southern France as a whole. His favourite toy is his flip video camera, which he uses to good effect, creating an ever-increasing number of informative and enthusiastic (and occasionally very funny) short videos, featuring visits to different growers the length and breadth of Languedoc and Roussillon, which he posts regularly on his Love That Languedoc blog. In fact, Ryan leaves no stone un-turned in using the power of the Internet to get the message across about the joys of wine as a whole, and about Languedoc and Roussillon in particular. Long may he keep blogging, Facebooking, Tweeting and generally bigging-up his adopted region!”
O’Vineyards O’Syrah 2005 Vin de Pays de La Cité de Carcassone
100% Syrah. Cassis, plums and bramble, beef and spice aromas – lots of fruit, but savoury too, with notes of garrigue herbs. The palate is rich and very spicy, but the Syrah character still comes through, and it is surprisingly elegant, for such a big wine.? At 5 years old, it is good to drink, but there is absolutely no hurry.
O’Vineyards Trah Lah Lah 2005 Vin de Pays de La Cité de Carcassone
65% Merlot, 35% Cabernet Sauvignon. Deep, dark colour, with a tiny rim. Again, a savoury, meaty nose, like a fruity gravy, with hints of new leather. The palate is rich with sweet fruit, still quite tannic, but with good underlying acidity. The finish is bitter-sweet. Another keeper. For me, not quite as enjoyable as the Syrah, but a good wine nonetheless.
O’Vineyards Proprietor’s Reserve 2005 Cabardès
Syrah, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon. There’s oak, but it is nicely integrated, with plenty of rich cassis and plum fruit, leather, polished wood and spice. The palate is loaded with rich, sweet fruit flavours, but with excellent balancing acidity, something akin to a new world Claret blend. In fact, if I somebody told me it was from California, I might believe them – and that would be no mean compliment. Very nice wine!
I like the way Ryan and his father are pushing the boundaries in the somewhat unfashionable (by which I mean relatively unknown) region of Cabardès, immersing themselves totally in the French culture, whilst bringing fresh ideas and new world innovation to the winemaking process. They deserve to succeed.
Ryan O’Connell, the cheeky chappy, together with his parents, Joe (American) and Liz (French Vietnamese) moved from Florida in 2005 to set up the O’Vineyards in Cabardes, within view of Carcassonne. They now produce a range of five robust, rich red wines made with Merlot, Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon.
Ryan is a great ambassador for the Languedoc, the Outsiders and la joie de vivre.
O’Vineyards must be as well known for Ryan O’Connell and his extrovert Languedoc wine videos as it is for wine. Being near Carcassonne the Mediterranean influence is relatively feeble which is why Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot are more suited. One word that summarises the three 2005s, their first full vintage, is oomph – but these wines are certainly not out of control and are not trying to be Bordeaux. O’Syrah 2005 is nice and chewy and I got pine, mint and dried plums. Trah Lah Lah 2005 (Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon) had spice and plenty of classic Merlot fruit cake and plum. Proprietor’s Reserve 2005 (Syrah with Merlot and Cabernet) combines the elements of the first two but racks up the fruit concentration while keeping everything in balance – it will go on for years.
Passion is an overused word when it comes to wine but it’s difficult to see what else could justify giving up a well-paid desk job to scrape by making wine in rural France. Any romantic dreams vanish after weeks of pruning in January’s biting winds. So they have made a conscious decision to move country and careers, as opposed to inheriting a domaine. Starting from scratch means having to learn quickly, not be afraid to ask lots of questions and to ask for advice. And just, well, give it a go.
Attending the tasting of the “Outsiders”, a group of Languedoc-Roussillon producers, in London this week made me think about what might have been. They’ve all done what I briefly considered, investing in vineyard and winery projects in the south of France, in many cases giving up successful careers to do so. The dozen members come from the UK, Ireland, Holland, Switzerland, New Zealand, Sweden, the USA and Bordeaux. If the last location sounds less exotic, it shouldn’t do. To most Bordelais, the Languedoc might as well be Tahiti.
The Mediterranean south is France’s biggest vineyard area, and one of the country’s most exciting wine-producing regions. So much so that over the past couple of decades folk from all over the world have been relocating to the south and following their vinous dreams, a move that invariably involves a change of career, from teaching, the law, advertising, finance, sales and marketing etc.
At a tasting this month in London a number of these so-monikered, (for the purposes of creative PR, one imagines), ‘Languedoc Outsiders’ presented some of their wines.
After seeing all the interest in how Chateau Margaux brings in the harvest, it occurred to me that I haven’t really talked about our own harvest intake. So without further ado, this is how we harvest at O’Vineyards … plus all done with pictures taken by a friendly tourist during our 2010 harvest!
It starts with grapes ready for harvest:
Then somebody picks those grapes and puts them in a bucket. And eventually that bucket gets dumped into a fruit crate.
Those fruite cases are brought back to the winery where my dad slowly feeds the fruit into a destemmer.
The destemmer consists of a large cylinder with a vice in its center. The cylinder has holes that let grapes through but generally don’t let stems through. The vice has arms that turn and pop the grapes off their stems.
Then the destemmer drops the grapes onto a vibrating sorting table. The grapes bounce down the table where my mom, our brave tourists, and I pick out any snails, stems or leaves that made it into the fruit crates.
At the end of the sorting table, the grapes drop off into a conveyor belt that lifts them to the top of the fermentation tanks.
The grapes start their maceration and fermentation in the tank. There are a lot of whole berries and a lot of berries are slightly crushed by the fall into the tank and the weight of the grapes above them.
Big thanks for these awesome photos. They were all taken by Jeremy and his friends who showed up unannounced on our first day of harvest so it is super authentic. No Hollywood mock ups or mise en scene. We were very happy to kick of harvest with them and I hope you enjoy a blow-by-blow photo journey through an O’Vineyards harvest in the south of France.
How to find us
Domaine O’Vineyards, located in the North Arrondissement of Carcassonne, is just minutes from the Carcassonne train station, the Medieval City, and the Carcassonne Airport.
GPS coordinates: 43.259622, 2.340387
O’Vineyards
Wine, Dine, Relax at our Boutique Vineyard
Unique thing to do in Carcassonne
Wine Cellar. Winery Visits. Wine Tasting.
Wine & Food Pairing
North Arrondissement of Carcassonne
885 Avenue de la Montagne Noire
11620 Villemoustaussou, France
Tel: +33(0) 630 189 910
Best by GPS.
Follow the signs to Mazamet/ Villemoustaussou using the D118. At the end of the last straight part of D118, you will come to a roundabout with the Dyneff gas station.
Take the exit towards Pennautier. Continue 500m to a small roundabout and go straight over.
Look out for the second road on your right, Avenue des Cévennes which curves up hill (about 1km) to Avenue de la Montagne Noire on the left.
At the last juction, bear left. the road sign “Ave de la Montagne Noire” (confusing as it seems to show a right turn)
After another 500m you will see our red brick color building in the middle of the vines.
