Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Spanish Tourist Sights in Barcelona and Winery visits in Catalonia: Cava winery tours in Catalonia, Spain

Barcelona is famous for the Dali museum and Gaudi buildings. Barcelona is the chief city of Catalonia region, which is famous for Cava. After you've seen the essential tourist sites, while there, you have the opportunity to visit a winery and learn about Cava.

Let's be clear about sparkling wine. The king of sparkling wines, the most expensive, is Champagne which comes from France. From Spain we get sparkling wine, Cava. From Italy we get Prosecco.

Cava is the Catalan word for cellar or wine cellar; think of it as the cave where the wine is stored.

Codorniu runs a shuttle bus from three pickup points in Barcelona for a small charge, except in the month of August. Why are they not operating in August, the height of the tourist season? I supposed it must be because the French and Spaniards shut down shops, restaurants and businesses in August. (Paris is dead. Everybody local is away from the big cities at the seaside.) Or because the vineyard picking season starts in September with winemaking going on apace until After Xmas, so they take their holidays in August.
This vineyard offers a variety of optional packages including lunches.

Handy websites on wines and vineyard tours
http://www.visitascodorniu.com/en/ (Shuttle bus from Barcelona.)
http://www.amigosdelasbodegas.com/bodegas/bodegas-bilbainas/?lang=en&ids=1 (Winery tour; Haro in Rioja region.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enotourism (Looks like Ecotourism but it's Ecotourism which is to do with wine.
http://www.spainfoodandwinetourism.com

Wine terms on bottles of wien from Spain
joven - juvenile, young, released for drinking straight away, not matured in oak (barrels),  pronounced (Ho - venn)
the bordeaux barrel which they can a b a r r i q u e is 25 cases of wine, 300 bottles, 325 litres - the most common side also used in

(Chianti region of Italy uses in T u s c a n y b o t t e - oak barrels or casks of 500-700 litres)
NB A slightly larger barrel in appearance can be much larger in volume.

Barrels start small, then you get casks, and the largest are vats, which are traditionally oak to give the smokey aroma and flavour, or modern ones of steel - or even concrete.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author, speaker.


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