I was out on a morning bushwalk when the ping of an incoming SMS drew me out of my forest trance. ‘Estoy llevando Tempranillo y voy a moler como a las 10.30’. It was my Argentine friend, Martin, and he had just received 600 kilos of Tempranillo grapes and was about to crush them. I had asked Martin to let me know when he was going to crush so I could watch the processing. I had hoped for more than a two-hour notice … but that’s the wine industry. You don’t…

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Vintage 2017 has started in the Adelaide Hills so I headed out to the vineyards to make sure my favourite bubbly, the Mordrelle Wines Blanc de Blancs, was being picked to perfection under the demanding eye of my compañero, Martin Moran. Martin and I played softball on the Hahndorf Men’s team for several years but I could tell that when he was out there in left field his mind wasn’t focussed on catching fly balls. Martin was aspiring to be a winemaker. He had immigrated to Australia from Mendoza in Argentina’s…

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