Grand Cru: An Inspiration

Last night, my husband and I watched a movie called Grand Cru, a story about Pascal Marchand's journey to become a vigneron. The name had a special resonance for us since we went to Ontario in 2012 and visited a few wineries and then became a part of Canadian Thanksgiving at Mary's home. It was there that we learned of Tawse Winery from Mary's nephew and first heard of Pascal Marchand. So, it was with interest that turned into inspiration that we watched this documentary.
The film follows one season in Burgundy, 2016, when the vineyard was hit with a hailstorm and the weather proved to be challenging for organic/biodynamic farming. But throughout the film are depicted, Marchand's respect for Nature and his adoption of some of the traditional modes of viticulture (horse drawn weeding) and winemaking (pigéage---a classic french wine-making method where the grapes are stomped down in open vats by foot).
When harvest time came, my husband and I perked up since the film showed the picking crew carefully harvesting the grapes and cleaning the clusters in the vineyard. After the clusters were brought into the winery, other people were there to separate only the best grapes from the clusters.

We can relate to how Mother Nature has the upper hand (our friend Charles Massoud would say "Mother Nature is the senior partner"), we can relate to the cleaning of grapes in the vineyard and the cleaning of grapes in the winery, but we also can relate to the satisfaction of working with nature and discovering the wonders each day brings.