This is by far the most unusual--and interesting--article you'll read this weekend. The Globe and Mail's Eric Duhatschek spoke with Los Angeles Kings broadcaster Jim Fox, former Red Wing Igor Larionov and former NHL'er Pavel Bure about the former-athletes-in-winemaking business, and you're going to enjoy reading this the whole way through:
Last August, Jim Fox was attending the University of California, at Davis, taking an extension course in winemaking, when he felt the first tremors. Fox was born in Coniston, Ont., but has lived in Los Angeles since 1981, when he first turned pro with the Los Angeles Kings. Not quite a native Californian, Fox has lived there long enough now to know what a major earthquake feels and sounds like – and this was big, 6.0 on the moment magnitude scale (MMS).
“My first thought was, ‘if this was San Francisco, they are in big trouble’ – because it was rocking,” Fox said. Soon after, he learned that the epicentre of the quake was near the West Napa Fault, where the entire vintage of his 2012 Patiné Cellars pinot noir was being stored. Patiné is a boutique wine project that Fox and his wife Suzie run in conjunction with noted winemaker Mike Smith. From vineyard to retail outlet, the process of making a fine wine takes years and involves endless hours of sweat and toil. To potentially have the whole inventory lost in a quake gave Fox one long uneasy night – until he found out his wines had come through nearly unscathed.
“The warehouse where they stored our wine I estimate would house at least 100,000 cases, if not more, and they only lost 20 cases total,” Fox said. “To lose only 20 cases at the epicentre of an earthquake is, I assume, good planning, good storage – but also good fortune. You cannot get earthquake insurance, so if we had lost it, we would have lost it.”
Create an Account
In order to leave a comment, please create an account.