Today was my trip to two winery's Concha y Toro and Santa Rita. Both these wineries are in the Maipo Valley, named as such because of the river that runs from the Andes and through the valley that is used to irrigate all the wineries in the area.
Concha y Toro is the first winery where we get off the bus and my tour (the english one) starts at 10.20 so we walk through these beautiful gardens with a gorgeous lake and then onto look at the vines which are labeled up so we can see which vines create what wine and so we can look at how different the leaves were. On my tour there were about 20 people and although it was the english speaking tour we had 10 gentlemen from china with a translater so you can imagine getting near the vines was hard without a wee chinaman and his camera getting in the way so I asked the guide if I can come back to take pictures at the end and she said yes so fast forward to the end of the tour and 2 wines tasted and a full glass of Sauv Blanc purchased and drunk and now I have an hour before I head off on the bus to Santa Rita so I thought I will go and have a walk in the gardens so off I go until a man is shouting after me so I turn around and look at him inquisitively (well probably it was my death stare but anyway...) and he asked me if I was on the 1pm tour so I replied "no I have had my tour" and he then told me that i couldn't be in the gardens and I must leave - I was half way down the path, probably about 50 feet from him so I replied "my guide told me I could go for a walk in the gardens" he replied that I couldn't walk in these gardens but I could walk in the ones next to the restaurant so I said "but I want to walk in these gardens" so he said that this would not be possible and I thought FUCK IT (more on Fuck It Therapy later) Fuck it, I have paid to be on this tour, I couldn't get pictures of the vines because of the wee chinamen so fuck it I will get my pictures so I said to the guy "I have paid for this tour and I will walk in these gardens and you can't stop me" and I turned and walked to the gardens and waited for security to eject me. I quickly took the photos of the vines I wanted to take just incase I was ejected but no one came for me - phew! So as I left I couldn't help myself but say to the guy at the gate "wasn't that hard to let me take a few pictures was it" He then started speaking Spanish on his radio so I scuttled off to the ladies loo figuring security wouldn't get me there.
From this....
There is some made up story about why the wine is called the Devils Cellar - apparently wine was being stolen in the olden days so they decided to say that the cellar was haunted by the devil and this apparently stopped the thieves. They were obviously not Scottish thieves - I think in Glasgow (or Fife) this would be seen as a challenge to take on the Devil whilst stealing his bucky!
So I left Concha y Toro without being arrested thankfully and headed off the Santa Rita but it wasn't long before I was in trouble again...
On the bus there were 12 of us 11 were spanish speaking and I was the only one who could only speak english so the tour guide on the bus was explaining everything in spanish then in English which was obviously direct straight at me as the only english speak. He then went into a long spanish monologue and I must have nodded off and I think I was having a nice Sauv Blanc dream until I was shaken awake by a slightly pissed off guide! I am not sure what I missed but he made sure he didn't repeat anything - he must have thought I was the rudest person ever but if they will give me two wines to taste and then leave me to my own devises for an hour and a half in the wine shop and the restaurant where I had a large glass of Sauv Blanc then put me on a warm bus - no wonder I fell asleep!
Anyway onto Santa Rita which was a really lovely winery - it was really down to earth and we got to see all of the workings, the huge steel vats that hold 11000 litres of wine until they are ready for bottling or they get decanted into American or French Oak barrels. We saw the bottling plant which is all fully automated - they bottle 80 million bottles of wine a year - they do bottle for all of the other Santa Rita wineries but its still a fair old amount of wine.
They have a proper story of what happened in their cellar too not just a made up story - during the war for independence in 18something 120 chilean soldiers that were on the run from the Spanish and were injured were hidden in the cellars - they were looked after by the land owner and given medical treatment. A little boy that was there helping with the soldiers in the cellars went on to become one of the presidents of the country in 1840 his name was Manuel Montt.
It was also interesting to see there were still lots of glass fragments on the floor around the area where they store the bottled wine - they lost quite a few bottles in the 2010 earthquake which also brought down the ceiling in one of the areas were barrels are kept.
Santa Rita was a really nice winery, it had a good energy around it where I think Concha y Toro was a bit up its own arse with its posh restaurant and beautiful gardens that no one is allowed to walk in. Santa Rita seemed all about the wine and the process, showing us everything and it felt more grass roots. so I will may be dump the Casillero del Diablo Sauv Blanc and take up with Santa Rita.
Here is a picture of me enjoying a Cabernet Sauvignon Reserva 2008 - I am not a big red wine drinker but it was very nice.
So a good day, well apart from nearly being escorted out of a winery!
I got back at about 6pm and went to investigate the tube station as I need to get the tube to Providencia tomorrow morning at 7.30am to get my lift to start the hike to the San Francisco Glacier - 6pm on a friday night is not the time to do a recce of a tube station - it was like Oxford Circus!! so I retreated to my apartment to drink beer on the roof and watch the sun set. Fuck it, I can get a taxi if I can't figure out the trains!
Off to the San Francisco Glacier tomorrow which hopefully is not too hard a hike as I haven't really done any training for anything in the last few months and my legs and bum are a bit sore from horse riding yesterday.
If you are interested in finding out more about Fuck It Therapy then look up John's website www.thefuckitlife.com - I am in the middle of reading Fuck It, the profane way to profound happiness and have read his other two books. Brilliant books and a therapy that works. I like to say Fuck It a lot as most of you know.
suzxxx
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