It is with no small excitement that I am able to announce a new trip to vino heaven, once again this year.
Navarra, Spain is both an autonomous region (Navarre) as well as an ancient wine region, whose wine roots date back up to 1,200 years. It was once a
great and proud kingdom and sits between what is now the Spanish wine appellation of
Rioja and the French wine appellation of
Bordeaux. Consequently, it has grows an
awesome mix of grape varieties from both regions that have been approved by the Navarra Denominación de Origen (DO):
Garnacha Tinta,
Tempranillo,
Graciano,
Mazuelo,
Cabernet Sauvignon,
Merlot,
Pinot Noir,
Shiraz,
Garnacha Blanca,
Malvasia,
Moscatel,
Viura,
Chardonnay, and
Sauvignon Blanc. It also has a long history as an
approved DO (the Spanish equivalent of a wine AVA or appellation that has strict, government-regulated quality control and approved grape growing and winemaking methods), celebrating its
75th anniversary in 2008. And it is to
Navarra that I have the great fortune to fly, this coming Saturday!
The heart of the Harvest season can be a surreal and crazy time. Yes, of course I guess, it's crazy when you have a ton of things going on at once, including actual tons of ripe fruit to process and 15+ hour days dragging down your health. Indeed, I was sick twice during weeks 4 through 6 at the Rock for Man Falls in the Vines - #MFITV, with the entire Chimney Rock Winery (Twitter, Facebook, WineLog) crew coming down with something, at some point. Crush isn't easy, that is known the industry over, but I was happy to see that I persevered along with everyone else (who are all harvest veterans) and learned quite a bit about what it was to work some of the most taxing parts of the harvest: digging out the fermentation tanks after barreling off our new free-run wine. 
