First day of pressing grapes

We had finally gotten everything working today when the press blew up – complete with smoke and terrible noises! The building was bustling this morning when we started the press for the first time, and when the juice started pouring into the catch pan, we literally had a crowd of about 15 construction workers standing around in awe of the process. It was a very exciting morning...until it crashed. It was during the second cycle of pressing the Traminette variety. Fortunately the electricians were working in the building and helped William – a very distraught William – figure out what was wrong. Our electricians figured out the problem (we hope) and the part is ordered and will be shipped overnight. It was quite a let-down from our initial excitement at getting everything started.