Some wine regions feel special. Places where lush vines should thrive naturally (like the rolling hills of Burgundy) or where it’s ridiculous that vines grow there at all, let alone flourish (like the sand of the Barossa Valley floor).
Yet Rueda, Spain’s Verdejo ground zero, didn’t seem special. Rolling hills but set on a flattish plain (but ringed by mountains), with gravel, sand and limestone soils dotted by uniformly stumpy vines, it felt more like winegrowing in the desert. Which is about right, given this is a hard place – the wind whips straight across the largely treeless plains, with weather that varies between cold and windswept to hot and desiccated, the high altitude (vines here sit between 700-920m asl) only upping the continental contrasts, with big summer diurnal temps to match. There wasn’t even any grass growing between the rows, just hard looking dirt- you can understand locals talking about having ‘9 months of winter and 3 months of hell’.
But that ‘vineyard on the edge’ feel is exactly what makes for great wine. A ‘pressure makes diamonds’ viticulture ethos where vines struggle, and deliver wines that feel unique. And my very brief trip to this part of NW Spain in early Feb delivered plenty of extra fresh wines to bang this home.
It was a rude shock post-Barcelona Wine Week, though (where it was cool yet the weather was pretty nice). I expected cold and rain, but not puffer jackets inside stuff with sideways wind. Over four long days exploring vineyards of Castilla y León, covering Rueda, Toro, and Ribera del Duero, the sideways rain barely stopped for more than an hour or so.
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