Bourgueil invades Tours: photos from the 8th edition in 2010

Tasting@Château de Minière

Château de Minière: Bertrand Mascarel, who sold up shortly after this

to Sigurd et Kathleen Mareels - Van den Berghe

Photos from Bourgueil's invasion of central Tours in March 2010. I have only just got round to sorting these out, so I'm not sure I have got all the names right and would much appreciate any corrections or details if I have got names wrong – many thanks!

Domaine du Petit Bondieu –Thomas Pichet

Jean-Marc Breton, Vignoble de la Grioche (above and below)

Ludovic Boucher, Domaine du Bois Mayaud

Laurent Herlin (above and below)

Vincent Delanque, Domaine de la Noiraie

Not a good photo of Vincent – will aim to do better this year!

Who is this please?

Reply: 'c'est Xavier Courant, du Domaine de l'Oubliée !'

Mid-afternoon – a busy time

June in Touraine – not as bad as it seemed

June 2010: at its worst!

Weather stats on Météo-France for Tours show that taken in the round June 2010 wasn't as bad as it seemed at the time, helped by better weather over the last week/ten days. With today forecast to be dry and sunny, the total June rainfall will be 54mm, with no rain recorded in Tours since 17th June. The average in the period 1971-2000 was 46.7mm. Average mean temperatures at 12.8˚ are above the average of 11.5˚, while the hours of sunshine are down (NB figs for 29th and 30th June yet to be added) at 181 hours compared to normal 215 hours. However, still well above the record low of June 2007 of just 142 hours.

Cold, wet spell continues

The cold and wet weather of the last 10 days or more continues. After a little respite on Wednesday, Thursday was miserable, Friday at little better with the temperature rising in the afternoon to around 22˚C. Today it is sharply backwards – wet with a temperature around 11.30 of only 11.5˚C for mid-June. Certainly not good for the vines' flowering.