WINE TOUR

Wed, 6 Jan 08, 3:10 PM

Buenos Tardes!

Today we met the other couple from Lynchburg and got a bit aquainted. Tom Sydnor is the father of Dr. Robert Sydnor whom I`ve known for ages. His companion, Josephine Woods, is a retired Specil Ed teacher, and she and Helen were surprised they had never crossed paths before.

We`re just back from our wine tour. Helen went up to take a nap, says she didn`t sleep a wink on our redeye flight. I`m pretty refreshed after a good night`s sleep. But I nodded off on our ride back from the tour, as most of us did. Our guide, Sole, talked on the way down, let us sleep on the way back.

On the 35-mile drive south to the winery, we saw a field of celantro, a spice-lke vegetable. Helen says there was some in her fish soup last evening. Sole spoke of Chile`s fruit and agricultural products control, which we already knew about. Sort of like California`s but more so. Very careful to not let fruit, cheese, etc. into the country. The land right around Santiago is flat but with buttes sticking up. The Maìpo Valley further south is flat with the coast range of mountains visible. Every kind of fruit is grown there except bananas and pineapples, she said, and she listed many of them. Sole said it rains in the winter, May through August, and is otherwise pretty dry, and if it`s especially dry they irrigate some. It was comfortably cool today. There are fruit stands along the way, and Sole said the prices are cheap. Chileans like to eat fruits raw. It`s just certain valleys in Chile that produce wine, that have the right climate for it. All types of wines are produced. Wines are exported to 100 countries. Both wine grapes and table grapes are grown. Table grapes are grown on taller vines than are wine grapes, and the table grape vines differ by forming a sort of canopy with grapes hanging from it. Chile has succeeded in protecting its wine grapes and their high quality rootstocks from viruses which have been devastating elsewhere.

We rolled into the town of Isla de Maipo. We could see many of the modest homes people live in but didn`t have a chance to photograph any of them. Utility bicycles in use were common.

We visited the Santa Ines de Martino winery. de Martino for short. This is a very large winery producing wines, I would say, of the highest quality. Our guide gave us a grand tour. I didn`t get his name. We were served three different wines, very generous, each in a differnet location. I liked the Chardonnay. Next was Carmenere, the red signature wine of Chile. Sole said you either like it or hate it. I didn`t like it. The last was a Shirax, a red wine I wasn`t crazy about either. But to the extent that I like wines at all, I like white wines.

After the tour, we were served lunch in a nice outdoor setting surrounded by grape vines. It was the first chance we`ve had to socialize with some of our tour group. Besides Tom and Josephine, we chatted with Eric & Bridgett from Maine and Ed & Gigi from Kansas. All around this huge grape area is a gated fence with three strands of electric wire, not barbed, above it. I asked Sole about it as we drove away, and she hadn`t known of it. I asked if it might be for deer, and she said they essentially don`t have deer -- just a few occasional domesticated ones.

Wine making is a very refined art. Hearing is a big problem for me. I`m sure I missed much of what our winery tour guide said. The quality of the wine depends on the climate (perhaps mostly) and the type of soil (also to the a large extent). Sole had said it also depends on the root stock. The wine guide said in his experience it doesn`t depend much on the age of the vines. The quality of many of the wines also has a lot to do with aging in wooden barrels. White wines other than Chardonnay are not aged in barrels. Chardonnay is aged in barrels but unpainted barrels. Red wines are aged in barrels with a wide red stripe painted on them. The barrels are only used twice. The barrels are oak. The oak (the barrels actually) come from France. The oak comes from different forests in France, and the barrels bear different trade marks. The oak that is best for one wine comes from a particular forest and that for another wine from another forest.
The type of wine grape that does best varies with climate (temperature) and therefore with locales in Chile. Wine grapes are grown over a certain north-south range. Farther north it is too cold. Farther south it is too warm. In Chile the wine producers had to learn fast as the industry grew fast. They didn`t have the benefit of centuries of experience as in France. The orientation of the grape vine rows in relation to the path of the sun is important to the quality of the grapes. If the rows are perpendicular to the path of the sun, the grapes will be "sunburned" (my word), and that is harmful. The rows need to be aligned parallel with the path of the sun so that the leaves can protect the grapes. I`m not positive I have the following correct, and maybe it varies some with wine type: Cold prematuration is six days. Fermentation is ten days. Maturation is twelve days. Residence in barrels is 12 to 22 months, and generally 20 to 22 months is best.

I have almost two hours until our evenng tour at 6 PM with dinner. I hope to do a little walking both for exercise and for sightseeing in that time.

:-)

Bernie