8 oct

Went to see Ray Walker in Nuits St Georges. Ray is an American who started making Burgundy wines five years ago. He recently wrote a book about his experiences, The Road to Burgundy. I read the book, liked it and wanted to interview him.

That’s easier said than done. Ever since publishing the book he has been bombarded by emails and easily misses some. “I used to be really good with emails” he claimed, when I spoke him a week ago. Those days are truly gone, I came to find out in the past week.

But I am getting ahead of myself. When we were in Nuits St Georges, a week and a half ago – the town where Raskel disappeared – I wrote him emails with no response, tried to phone but got the wrong number, tried to phone with the right number but nobody picked up. Walked by his house, it looked closed off. Maybe he had already finished up with his grapes, I thought, which was strange because the harvest in Burgundy hadn’t started yet.

I basically gave up, but on our “last evening in Nuits St Georges” stroll, I wanted to show Julie his house. There was a big Range Rover in front of the house – parked in the middle of the street. That’s Ray’s car I told Julie. She laughed. I had claimed to see Ray Walker a few days before in a restaurant in Dijon. I even asked Claire to go and ask him if he was Ray Walker, which she wouldn’t do. He had a white beret on, which is why Julie and Claire started calling him Ray le Blanc, which is inaccurate because Ray os black, but Julie and Claire don’t mind those kind of details.

It must have been his car, some cool American music playing. A woman drove up behind it, waited 2 seconds, got impatient, got out of the car, asked us if we knew what was going on, we shrugged, got back to her car and honked her horn for a full five seconds.

Out walks, tata, Ray Walker, looking at the woman as if she is crazy, asks her what’s going on, is stupefied she is so impatient, looks at her numberplate, sees she’s from a different department, mumbles “bloody foreigner” between his teeth and parks his car on the spot further up the road that has just been emptied.

Are you Ray Walker I ask him when he comes back, which I do know he is, because I recognize his face from the jacket photo of his book. I explain my intentions about interviewing him, which he says is great but he’s rather busy now. Sunday, this is friday, the grapes will come in, that’s why he will be busy till at least wednesday. But afterwards would be fine with him. “Just email he says, I will respond.”

Which he didn’t till I wrote the fourth email yesterday saying that he must have been very busy or sick of journalists, but that I thought it a pity not to meet him again. And that’s when he responded: “Let’s meet tomorrow at 10.30.”

Great I answered and there I was at 10.30 in front of Maison Ilan as he has called his wine brand. But no Ray. There was a little note at the bell asking not to use it but just to knock on the gate doors. Which I did. Gentle first, but after a few tries a little firmer and then quite hard. No movement in the house. So I use the bell, but with the shortest possible ring.

Immediately a window opens on the second floor, Ray peeks out irritated about which bloody foreigner cannot read his little note. He looks puzzled. I tell him that I taught we had an appointment at 10.30. It was five minutes later. Then he seems to remember and walks down.

It is a crazy idea to do an interview in harvest time, he says. He was up till 4.30 last night trying to get grapes in the fermenting barrel. Up at 7 again to bring his daughter to school. And today would be the same story again, now with the famous Chambertin grapes, which make him unique as a foreigner in Burgundy. The only one who makes real Chambertin wine, so exclusive that Ray himself never even drank a bottle till he bottled them himself. Now he’s asking €240 a bottle himself, crazy world.

Well, the interview was a pleasure, he’s a fascinating guy, and, though obviously tired, still able for some compulsive thoughts on wine and winemaking. What about this one: “Burgundy is full and complex, it is like an opera. Bordeaux is like a … commercial. It is flat.”

Don’t know if it is true, but it will make a great story.