It has been a flurry of bottling activity here at Pepper Bridge. We just finished bottling the last of the 2007 vintage which includes the Cabernet, the
Pepper Bridge Vineyard designate, and a little bit of Reserve (Yeah!). These wines will now rest in bottle for their grand unveiling a year from now.
It is such a long time to wait but it is going to be worth it. The word on the street is that 2007 is really something special. The growing season was just what Jean-François is looking for, plenty of sun and heat in the summer and a long harvest with warm sunny days and very cool nights.
When we get cool nights during harvest here in Walla Walla the grapes retain more natural acidity and develop more flavors and aromas. For Pepper Bridge, the resulting wines for 2007 are delicious, full of dark fruit and earth with lots of complexity. Maybe this is the best vintage to date for Walla Walla? So bottling this exciting wine is in and of itself an event, but add to it all the excitement of bottling with a brand new bottling truck.
This was the debut of the brand new mobile bottling line, Bugle Bottling. This is a cooperative venture between Pepper Bridge and
AbejaWineries and the
Artifex custom crush facility. It has been a long time in the planning and the building and now the truck is operational and bottling wine.
It is a pretty slick operation to see in action. Most of the wineries in Walla Walla depend on mobile bottling lines but this new truck is pretty high tech, lots of sensors and automation.
On a personal level, I am very excited about the automated capsuling machine that eliminates my job on the bottling truck. I am sure that the computer controlled machine will do a far better job than me and will never get bored of capsuling for 8 hours straight. Special thanks to Dana Lane for the fabulous photos!
It is such a long time to wait but it is going to be worth it. The word on the street is that 2007 is really something special. The growing season was just what Jean-François is looking for, plenty of sun and heat in the summer and a long harvest with warm sunny days and very cool nights. 
When we get cool nights during harvest here in Walla Walla the grapes retain more natural acidity and develop more flavors and aromas. For Pepper Bridge, the resulting wines for 2007 are delicious, full of dark fruit and earth with lots of complexity. Maybe this is the best vintage to date for Walla Walla? So bottling this exciting wine is in and of itself an event, but add to it all the excitement of bottling with a brand new bottling truck. 
This was the debut of the brand new mobile bottling line, Bugle Bottling. This is a cooperative venture between Pepper Bridge and AbejaWineries and the Artifex custom crush facility. It has been a long time in the planning and the building and now the truck is operational and bottling wine. 
It is a pretty slick operation to see in action. Most of the wineries in Walla Walla depend on mobile bottling lines but this new truck is pretty high tech, lots of sensors and automation. 
On a personal level, I am very excited about the automated capsuling machine that eliminates my job on the bottling truck. I am sure that the computer controlled machine will do a far better job than me and will never get bored of capsuling for 8 hours straight. Special thanks to Dana Lane for the fabulous photos!
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