Early this week I was told by a good friend... "You are behind on your blog." "What blog...?" I responded.
It's been more than six months since the last time I posted anything on my blog. It's certainly not for lack of material to write about. Writing does not come as easy to me as I would hope, so I labor over each post. Sometimes it takes me an hour to write a mere 4 or 5 paragraphs. An hour may not sound like much, but an hour is a long time when you have so little left after all other important tasks are done.
So yeah, over the last 6 months I could have written about many things. I could have told you that...
- In June I renewed my lease and committed to downtown New Bedford for another three years. In the process, I increased the overall winery space by 60% with the addition of a new area that is dedicated to tastings and sales.
- I invested into two new 500-gallon tanks specifically made for white wine fermentations. These are "closed" tanks with a small opening on top. They are made to ferment juice with temperature control. No grapes can go into these tanks (technically it could be done, but it would be "hell" to get them out after).
- 2011 was a disappointment in terms of my ability to purchase a variety of locally grown grapes. As a result, I'm considering an increase in production of wines made with grapes grown elsewhere. With no vineyard of my own and no ability to secure locally grown grapes, there is no choice but to purchase more grapes from other states. Rest assured that we'll continue to label our wines clearly so that you know what is grown locally and what is not.
- Edson Pereira, my cousin who was part of the winery pretty much from day one and the face of Travessia to many of our customers, has left to pursue a different professional endeavor. Luckily I found Stephanie Mikolazyk who is the chef and manager at Quicks Hole Restaurant in Woods Hole, MA. Stephanie has been running our tasting room since November and doing a superb job at it. She will be with us until March of 2012.
- We just recently received a license from the New Bedford Licensing Department and the Massachusetts ABCC to sell our wines by the glass at the winery. The licensing process took almost four months. This new license also gives us the ability to host events in our tasting room, something that we did not previously have. We look forward to hosting many events in 2012. Birthday party at the winery anyone?
I honestly don't know what it will become of this blog in 2012. You can always reach me via twitter or facebook. You can also join our email list which you can easily do through our website. Till then....
Thank you so much for reading. I hope that 2012 is a phenomenal year for you.
*Picture courtesy of @mattmedeiros
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