The image of what could have been –but wasn’t– has lingered in the minds of winegrowers across Galicia these past weeks. The August fires also ravaged hectares of vineyards in Ribeiro, Monterrei, Valdeorras, and Ribeira Sacra, leaving a landscape of green and black in this harvest, where geometric patterns and serpentine traces of fire can be seen. There is consensus that, despite the losses, the damage could have been much worse –though it will take weeks–, perhaps months, to truly assess the reality. All agree it was no miracle: it was the worked land, its firebreak effect, and the commitment to a life bound to the grape and to nature, while abandonment surrounds other plots.