 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
| Established in 1845 Dunham was the first
township of Lower-Canada and also the first town in Québec
to see large vineyards establish themselves and win international
prizes for their wines. On route 202 stood a little white wooden
house, an old inn where carriages and travellers would stop at the
turn of the last century. Behind it: vines, 14 hectares of maturing
grapes. This is where the Orpailleur was born and lives on. In 1982
French winegrowers Hervé Durand and Charles-Henri de Coussergues
along with their Québécois associate, producer Frank
Furtado, decided to take the plunge. Pierre Rodrigue joined the team
in 1985. Together they persisted in defying our challenging climate
by applying vine producing methods adapted from Northern Europe and
the USSR. For the most part, it consists in ridging-up the roots
in the fall to protect them from the cold and ploughing them back
in the spring, when the ground thaws out. After three years of hard
work, in the fall of 1985, the vineyard’s first harvest produced
15,000 bottles of a delicious white wine named L’Orpailleur
by Gilles Vigneault, meaning “gold gatherer”. |
|
 |
|
Photos : Manuel Furtado |
