Throughout Italy this is the heady time of la vendemmia. Grapes are grown almost everywhere along the peninsula, including some of the smallest remote offshore islands, so chances are that driving through the countryside you'll come across groups of people harvesting. The earliest grapes may be gathered in late August or early September in southern regions, but the main harvest continues throughout the autumn months, sometimes even well into November. You can watch workers undertaking the backbreaking task of selecting and snipping grapes off the vines manually, putting them into small boxes and carrying them over to the trailers that wait at the ends of the rows. It is hard work! There was a time when students waited for the grape harvest to get some money to pay their university fee before the academic year kicked off; I remember some of my friends waking up at dawn to go work in the vineyard and coming back exhausted, and with a few wasp stings. Today, some wineries offer tourists the chance to pay to join them and experience 'la vendemmia', like in the case of Sting (a different kind of sting!) in his estate in Tuscany. If you are considering to buy a similar experience, just remember that the true experience can be a rewarding but though one.