Many years have passed, about 25, since I planted my first vineyards in the Uco Valley, working in the middle parts of the Valley and grafting all kinds of varieties, both for replacement and to test resistant rootstocks.
Exciting experiences and discoveries full of learning that I will never be able to properly repay to my mentors. It was a time when one just came out and was surprised by everything.
I still remember how much I liked to find in physiology the answers to “you could produce better”. Everything better, quality and quantity.
Those were times when canopy management dictated the orders of what a quality vineyard should be; training systems with all their alternatives, distances, rootstocks, measurements in irrigation, soil, plant … a whole barrage of tools to understand how that complex world worked when many times there was no explanation.
The years went by and with them the plantations, the areas, the soils and climates, the hits and misses … but perhaps most importantly, the places and their people. Each landscape with its particularity. And with the years, the answers to the whys that science often cannot explain were sometimes unconsciously accumulated.
Today I think that just as there were winemakers who sometimes overused technology to transform what came to their wineries, there were also winegrowers who micro-oxygenated their vineyards excessively, searching for the best wine through the innumerable practices that a vineyard can be subject to.
Those were times when it was thought that what was done in viticulture was decisive on quality, but above anything else! First it was management, and then climate-soil-location. Without management, the other aspects did not count. And just as winemakers used 200% new wood, micro-oxygenations, saignées and delestages at their discretion, in the vines leaves were removed, fruit was thrown and the shoots were blunted as many times as necessary …
And at the time of the whys, the book answers were far from explaining everything and, especially, from confirming or rather shaping the searches.
Fortunately, time and practice continue… Traveling, observing, comparing, being in the right place at the right time and, above all, seeing reflected in the result what you have projected are the true forgers of identity. Wines with identity come from vines with soul.
And the only thing that is achieved with those vineyards that are manipulated to give what they finally cannot is to take away their soul. I think that if things are not in the right place, it is better to leave them as they naturally are – their natural beauty is likely to go beyond what excessive intervention wants to accomplish with them.
For this reason, almost fifteen years ago I began to plant natural untrained vineyards, seeking the best communion between the vines and their landscape. They had no support more than their own tutors during the first years, no wires to lean on, and different varieties grew in dissimilar shapes and at varied distances. As I always say, the last thing I have planted is what I have especially enjoyed and, at the same time, what has taught me the most.
And I am very pleased that goblet-trained plantations have thrived in the high areas of the Uco Valley, as well as in other regions such as Pedernal and Uspallata, and that they are still being counted in other areas, too. I hope they are all in communion with their environment.
According to my experience, the idea of a small plant of low expansion and balanced in its production has adapted very well to the cold climate of the Uco Valley and to restrictive soils –either very stony, or superficial, or short.
These limitations lead to a plant whose buds will not be able to grow more than its roots do, and whose productive capacity will have an inverse relationship with its degree of restriction. The more the constraints, the smaller the amount of fruit.
Those plants could also be well-trained, sometimes I imagine that if it is not in goblet, it could be in low espaliers, like those of the old French vineyards, with canopies never longer than one meter, but with little load. I think they would bear wonderful fruit and be a true postcard from our mountain vineyards.
Our Wines
What better intro than to say that it was one of the most irregular and inconsistent harvests in recent years …
Not because it was complicated – after all, there were not so many problems with the grape once it was in the winery – but because it was unpredictable. It can never be generalized in terms of harvests, neither for good nor for bad, especially taking into account the number of elements at stake, the meso and microclimates, the soil differences and, obviously, the knowledge and management of the winegrowers.
It was a typical harvest to remember – in the most challenging years, the best places come to light.
As it was a rainy year, we looked not only for high plots but also for soils with less absorption and greater surface runoff. Our Iubileus, La Craie and Volare emerged from these soils as a faithful expression of a cold, rainy and waiting year.
Volare del Camino is a Malbec with super fine tannins and a slightly wider mouth than PerSe. It is the most mature wine of the three, with red fruit and spices but with a tendency to black fruit.
It comes from a small plot of soil with shallow limestone and decomposed granite which, without being either white rock or painted stone, gives us a wine that maintains depth and intensity, but with good fluidity and tension.
Iubileus is generally the most expressive wine of the three, perhaps it is the very subtle presence of Cabernet Franc that gives it a very expressive nose with floral and fruit aromas, also somewhat earthy or rather chalky. It is always more outgoing than La Craie initially, shifting between red fruit, flowers, and spices. In the mouth, the wine has more silky than austere tannins, a good tension, and a very fresh finish.
Malbec was fermented in used French oak barrels, closed with daily rollings, and Cabernet Franc in open barrels with gentle punch downs.
La Craie represents the calcareous character of the site. It is always restricted, somewhat closed at the beginning, sober, austere in aromas, but it quickly migrates to wildflowers, earthiness, chalk powder or dry white rock, peppercorn tree, and subtly spiced. It has great tension, and its acidity is always sharper than that of Iubileus, either vertical or taut on the palate. The most interesting thing for us about this wine is its depth, the main characteristic that distinguishes it.
The La Craie vineyard is located at 1,300 meters above sea level, in the sector with the most calcium carbonate in the soil. The two grape varieties were manually harvested in late March and transported in bins to be vinified together.
Malbec and Cabernet Franc were destemmed and co-fermented in used French oak barrels, on the basis of approximately 75% Malbec and 25% Cabernet Franc.
Fermentation was spontaneous with indigenous yeasts and vinification was carried out with a very gentle daily punch down. The skins were in contact with the wine for 35 days.
Nothing else to say…
Cheers!