Private Wine Tour part 1

 

I’m quite pleased with my find. After some online research I found a private driver. The cost was low and our driver knew the wine trail very well. He picked us up at 9 and brought us home at 6. We were able to enjoy the wine and the sights under the guidance of a knowledgeable guide. We went to Alta Vista, Zapata, Dolium, Patti Caramelo and Azur.  Stuart will elaborate the first two wineries:

 

Alta Vista Bodega is set against a back drop of the Andes Mountains.  When you approach the winery the mountains seem to rise up when the fields of vines end.  Playing in the lawn in front of the winery are Indian “rabbits” which do not have long ears, and appear to be more tailless squirrels than rabbits.   

 

We joined the tour of Alta Vista at the fermentation vats.  Their different quality of wines had three different vats to ferment them, which varied in size and material (the different material varied the ability to maintain a constant temperature.)  We headed down stairs into the wine cellar and listened to the tour guide discuss the barrels (80% French 20% American oak) and the different duration spend in them for the different wines.

 

  Within the wine cellar was a cage, and with in it many different bottles of wine.  When asked about it the guide said that it was the owners personal collection.  The prizes of the collection was the 1998 Alto.  Apparently most of the grape crop in 1998 was lost in Argentina, largely due to over raining caused by El Nino (which is Spanish for “The Nino” (check link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEoHz56jWGY .)  Rather than allow their first crop to  go to waste the enologist collected that which he could and treated it as an elite wine.  The wine never went to market however, and simply sits in the cage for the personal use of the wine maker. 

 

Now that little anecdote might illuminate that Alta Vista was not a normal winery.  They do a few things that seem….eccentric.  Such as the floors and furniture of the winery being made from old oak barrels, the tasting room being an old concrete fermentation vat, and the metal doors to the winery being the metal strips that hold the barrels together.  While this is all kind of fun, the most interesting and seemingly eccentric that thing they did was the wine line called the “Los Escasos,” or in English “The rare ones.”  This line is only sold at the winery its self and consists of the experimental products of the wine makers.  Only three were for sale at the time, but apparently there has been as many as 4, a Syrah, a Torrentes, a Cabernet-Sauvignon and a Petit Verdot.  Each bottle has a figured drawn upon the labeling which related to the character of the wine.  The Cabernet has a large portly French man, and the Torrentes had a sort of country belle. 

 

 

 Alta Vista also had great appreciation for their Terroir.  They have a line of Malbec from each of the three different vineyards that they blend to make their Reserve Malbec.  If one has the tongue, the interest, the time and the money one can try all three and then the final outcome in the Reserve Malbec.  We were able to taste winery’s lesser Torrentes, and Malbec and were luckily enough to try the Los Escasos Syrah as well.

 We made a purchase and headed out to the car, eager for the next winery, La Catena 

 La Catena Zapata boasts a headquarters inspired by Mayan pyramids. 

 

While the introductory video claims that doing so was a gesture that attempted to differentiate Argentinean wines from European wines, it has a seemingly opposite effect, that is to create a very touristy feel to the vineyard. The video we watched (the only one in all of the wineries) was subtitled in English and seemed to attempt to lump praise upon La Catena Zapata.  From the architecture of the headquarters, to the Buenos Aries architect who designed it, to the use of Argentinean materials in its construction and furnishing, the video attempted to suggest that THIS vineyard was Argentinean.  The was despite that it was the only one to feature a video, have most of its employees speak English, not show the factory itself, start the French inspired DOC classification, send its children to study in Stanford and Harvard and great us with an handshake instead of a kiss on the cheek. 

 

 

 

 

 This is not to say the visit was not amazing.  The building was beautiful and offered an panoramic of the vineyard and the mountains from the roof.  The vineyard was interested in variation of altitude in its wine making, and how to blend them in such a way to create a good wine.  In fact the Malbec-Malbec, a blend of two Malbec grown at different altitudes, was one of the best wines I have ever had.

 

 

 

 

 

 

~ by aedlund on January 15, 2009.