Waking up in a dewy field in rural Herefordshire, in a tent with a restless puppy and a roaring hangover, is not something I thought I’d get to do this year.
A handful of friends from the cider industry had gathered in the orchards—heavy with fruit, branches burdened, and littered with ripening windfall—of the Ross on Wye Cider & Perry Company, otherwise known as Ross Cider. We were there to revel in the release of this year’s Raison d’Être, a phenomenal cider matured in Islay whisky casks. The result was beautifully juicy, smoky, and complex; it wholly exemplified Ross Cider’s unique approach to cidermaking.
The weekend would, in any normal year, be buzzing with the events of the Ross Cider Festival. Instead of drunk merrymakers filling the farm’s main barn to the rafters with raucous dancing, this year’s event was a jumble of friends sharing bottles of their own ciders and perries from a safe distance, staving off the cold with the warm hug of alcohol, and relishing simply being in each other’s company.
To me, with everything that’s happened—or, in the case of so many sorely missed events, not—this year, that’s as good as the biggest festival.
Words + PhotoLily Waite