Thanks for watching. You can leave a comment here, or join the debate (with scores of comments on this video) over at blog.bauduc.com.

Or help fill the coffers of our ‘in search of quality grapes’ fund by placing an order - click the red Chateau Bauduc button at the top of the page, and head for ‘Buy wine’.

Bordeaux were last champions in 1999, the year we arrived here. It’s also good to see a direct wine connection, in that the Président,  Jean-Louis Triaud, is the owner of two châteaux in Saint-Julien - the little-known, classified growth Château St-Pierre and the unclassified but better known Château Gloria.

I met the affable Monsieur Triaud last autumn in his smoke-filled office, just opposite Château Ducru-Beaucaillou on the D2 wine route, when I went to taste his 2006s in bottle. He’s the son-in-law of the late Henri Martin, who created Gloria by buying up parcels of St-Julien over many years, and left his mark as Mayor of St-Julien by plonking a huge, replica wine bottle near the road. I should think the Martin-Triaud household will be cracking open some fairly decent stuff up there this summer.

In the middle of the night, at 3.30 in the morning on 13th May, we were battered by a hailstorm. And when violent winds accompany the sound of hail, we know it’s very bad news. Parts of Bordeaux were hit the night before, on Monday 11th, and we’d had a smattering of peanut-sized hail too. Our vineyard manager Daniel joked yesterday that if we’d been included in that storm, with hailstones the size of new potatoes, we should change our métiers, or jobs. I don’t think he was expecting lightning to literally strike twice.

On close inspection first thing this morning, this is by far the worst we’ve seen here. We lost 50% of the crop on 24 June 2003, and last year we had frost in April that wiped out much of our sauvignon blanc.

This year, as a result of last night’s hailstorm, the amount of white we can make will be far lower still, which is really sad considering the amount of new vines we’ve planted. The merlot has taken a pounding too - around the château we’ve lost perhaps 80% of the potential crop of all varieties, spread over some 16 hectares or 40 acres. Younger vines, which are not yet in production, have also been hit, and have probably been set back a year due to the damage to the young wood.

We are now spraying to try and save what’s left, but it’s not looking good. There certainly won’t be any Les Trois Hectares white in 2009, as every old sémillon vine there has been trashed for this year, and we’re attempting damage limitation for next year’s crop, as the branches of the vines have been peppered.

Judging by the collapse in the price of sauvignon blanc from New Zealand after a bumper 2009 harvest the other side of the world, you might just detect a hint of Marlborough in the Château Bauduc Bordeaux Blanc for 2009. Although I somehow doubt we could get the tanker past the authorities.

Cue ‘Always look on the bright side of life’, from The Life of Brian. And a ‘Sod the Donkey - Adopt a Vine’ appeal to our customers. Buy now before prices rise.

More anon. If I can summon up the enthusiasm, that is.

However, instead of simply putting the record straight and squashing the story, Parker hit out at bloggers and others in the forum on his website, which in turn is controlled with a heavy hand by one of the alleged guilty parties, Mark Squires.

I posted this comment, entitled ‘Has Parker lost the Plot?’ on Jancis Robinson’s ’subscribers only’ forum, following her article called ‘The ethics of wine writing‘:

“Has anyone else been following the link from Jancis’s perfectly-pitched article on ‘The ethics of wine writing’, to drvino.com? At first, Robert Parker squares off his own, much publicized rules (’It is imperative for a wine critic to pay his own way. Gratuitous hospitality in the form of airline tickets, hotel rooms, guest houses, should never be accepted…’) with those of some of his Wine Advocates (’I did tell Jay no more vineyard tours paid by Wines of Argentina’).

More amusing is the attack on bloggers and others, with Parker seeing himself, rather bizarrely, as the underdog. Look out for conspiracy theories about ‘this Jihad’, ‘blobbers’, ‘extremists’ and, er, Decanter magazine. Even the Taliban get a mention.

Riveting stuff.”

Jancis responded:

“I am jumping in here - some of you will understand why I am wary of stirring up anything Parker-related - simply to state my belief that the way we can all best benefit from this interweb thingy is to be as open as possible. Visitors to this forum and this site should feel quite free to link to any other sites and blogs, and comment on them.

I know the odd purple pager has been rather coy about mentioning other wine sites and/or apologised for linking to them, but I think the interesting issues raised in this thread show just how difficult, and probably counter-productive, it is to try to erect walls in cyberspace.

I shall return to this topic!”

I’m not convinced that we’ve seen the end of this either - unless, of course, our attention is diverted by the less important things in life, like a global Swine Flu pandemic.

Jane Anson’s report highlighted the fact that this exclusive label has been awarded to us for free, and that we’re celebrating ten years as the house wine at his restaurants.

‘Gordon Ramsay’s Selection’ includes two whites, a red and our rosé, all of which are served at his restaurants. All are currently available direct from our website, including a super mixed dozen.

On friday, the same day that the Decanter.com news item was published, we delivered a few cases to the Ramsay household for their post-London Marathon party today. Perhaps our new strapline should be ‘So good, Gordon drinks it at home’.

The real surprise though is that there seems to be a genuine desire to launch a quick ‘en primeur’ campaign, with the possibility of the First Growths - Latour, Lafite, Margaux (above), Mouton Rothschild and Haut-Brion - coming out with an opening offer in the next couple of weeks, before most of the lower ranks. And that would be big news here as it would turn the normal routine on its head.

What usually happens is that the trade and wine press come to the tastings, and there’s much chat about which estates did well and the disastrous state of the market, and then everyone goes home and waits for Robert Parker to release his scores at the end of April. (’I may be disappointed if Jancis Robinson doesn’t like my wine, but I don’t eat if Robert Parker gives me a bad score’, the owner of one top château in Pauillac told me.)

Parker will have liked a lot of what he’s tasted, especially in Saint Emilion and Pomerol (eg L’Evangile, left), and at some of the top estates on the Left Bank, but will not want to be too enthusiastic for fear of the Châteaux getting above themselves.

Merchants and potential customers around the world then have to wait for the château owners to release their prices for the wines, which are still in barrel. It’s potentially quite exciting, and with great vintages like 2000 and 2005 everyone wants to splash out on super wines for much less than they’ll be worth in the future. But in the two most recent campaigns, for the 2006s and especially the 2007s, the wines haven’t been wildly exciting and the top châteaux have taken an age to set their prices - and when they have, the prices have been too high.

So the standard timechart has been for the reviews to be published online by wine critics in April, the trade then waits fruitlessly for some juicy offers in May, and eventually many leading châteaux ‘come out’ in June - after guessing what their neighbours are up to - until finally the First Growths astound everyone with their monster prices at the end of June. That’s three months - and way too long.

For the First Growths to turn the form-book upside down in order to kick-start the 2008 campaign, in a very difficult market, is a bold move. Corinne Mentzelopoulos, owner of Château Margaux, told me that the Bordeaux négociants (the intermediaries between the chåteaux and importers worldwide) were pressing for a quick campaign, and lower prices of course, but that there was still time to reflect. My own view is that she’d have little to gain by waiting for Parker’s score.

Alain Vauthier, proprietor of Château Ausone and maker of Saint Emilion’s most expensive wine, said to me yesterday that he was ‘Sûr. Presque sûr’ that the First Growths would release their prices by the end of April at ‘un prix attractif’. ‘Le marché est mort’, he said. Not for your wine, Alain.

Will the First Growth owners have the courage to breath life into the upcoming campaign, when there is at least some momentum and enthusiasm for the wines?

We’ll see.

‘How was your trip?’ I asked. ‘You’re the first living people we’ve seen’ was James’s first dejected remark to us, after their long drive south to Bordeaux. Their Wine Adventure had begun.

In hindsight, it would have been better not to mention the price of a bottle as it dates very quickly. £6.50? These were the heady days when the exchange rate was 1.47 euros to the pound, and UK duty on a bottle was a lot less.

If you’d like to leave a comment, or ask a question, feel free to do so below.

You can also do this on YouTube by clicking on the video window above. While we’re on the subject of YouTube, it’s difficult not to laugh at this clip from a more recent episode.

Fair to say that by this stage in their relationship, they were letting their hair down.

What’s strange is that I’d planted a little corner of different varieties for test purposes right here - chardonnay, riesling, viognier, chenin blanc, pinot noir, syrah and so on. All completely illegal of course under French appellation law* but the vines are clearly identified, ahem, as being part of the garden, not the vineyard. The huge branch has fallen right across the chardonnay. So there is a God, or at least one who’s on the side of the people who make the rules.

Another cedar has come down on the right hand side of the drive as you head towards the château. The uprooted base is absolutely massive, towering above 5 year-old Tom, and the vulnerability of cedar trees, with their shallow root systems, is clear to see. Once they’ve toppled over, that is.

* We’re only allowed to grow merlot, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, malbec, petit verdot, and carmenère for the reds, and sauvignon blanc, sémillon and muscadelle for the whites. Pinot noir and chardonnay, the red and white varieties respectively in Burgundy, for example, are strictly verboten in Bordeaux. It’s all about typicity and terroir, you see.

Now where’s the chainsaw? And the tractor…

So the children can cope just as well, as can Ronan, the former head sommelier from Gordon Ramsay’s, below.

Tom and Amelia, sporting the very smart Bauduc apron, would certainly rather do this than go to school.