Before I moved to Spain (quite a few years ago now) my last boss in the UK wine trade did not really like journalists, and also had a very low opinion of wine competitions. For the sake of decency I can’t repeat in my blog what he actually said about them, but suffice to say he thought that they were a waste of time….

My own personal view is mixed – of course journalists can help to form opinion, and steer consumers towards new discoveries, but on the other hand they can never tell people what they should or shouldn’t drink. Very fortunately we all like different things and have different tastes, which in the end, helps to make the world of wine a much more interesting place.

At Castro Martin we have never stopped submitting samples to wine guides and the occassional magazine, but I have to say that we do not actively enter many wine competitions unless we feel that it will really make a difference…… and that is my point. To enter wine competitions is actually quite an expensive business – not only the cost of sending samples around the world, but then there are often some very steep entry fees to be paid as well. For the amount that we spend, we would, quite naturally, like to see some small return.

Over the years we have been lucky enough (or perhaps I should say good enough) to pick up our fair share of medals and awards, but if I am to be very honest, hand on heart, these ‘gongs’ have had very little or possibly no impact at all on our sales. I guess this might be the reason that my ex-boss was so sceptical – sometimes you do begin to ask yourself the question “is it actually worth it”?

I have always been a great advocate of the idea “let the wine speak for itself”. Yes, a journalist can steer you towards your first experience of a new wine, but it’s when you pull the cork that you ultimately decide whether you will buy the wine again. In this respect I am much more confident that once you taste our wine you will not hesitate to repeat your purchase, and that, in my book, is the true measure of success.

As I think I have said before, the quality of importers and customers that we have around the world is a much better reference than a hatful of gold medals.

Oh, and by the way, the Mi Vino magazine wrote some very nice comments about our Castro Martin Family Estate (served on British Airways First Class), but in this instance they were not actually awarding points or medals……

It transpires that over the next 24 hour period the number of lightning strikes in Galicia exceeded all previous records, with over 7,000 recorded flashes – 4,000 during the morning storm, and a further 3,000 later in the day. Since the formation of Galicia’s local weather bureau back in 2001, it has apparently been rare to see days exceeding 4,000 strikes, and so this extraordinary number has set a new benchmark.

Suffice to say that this storm did not feature in any forecast, as many different weather sites predicted only a 25% possibility of any precipitation (some showed no rain at all). They certainly did not forecast the heavy rain that caused local flooding and traffic chaos in the Galician towns of Ferrol and Carballo.

My very favourite and most reliable weather predictor is shown in the photo above – I am planning on making one!

I can’t quite remember which American actor was recently ridiculed when he suggested that he was looking forward to seeing Manchester United and Milan in the World Cup, but perhaps he wasn’t quite as stupid as you may think……

No less than 7 of Spain’s starting 11 players in last night’s semi-final hailed from FC Barcelona – so you might almost be forgiven for suggesting that Sunday’s final will be between Holland and Barcelona!

Following the final whistle of the game Spain went completely wild – I have never seen so many Spanish flags….. ever. The sound of car horns and fireworks reverberated around our local town well into the early hours of the morning, so I can’t even begin to imagine what might happen if they actually win the final on Sunday. It will be madness.

To finish on a slightly sad note, please spare a thought for Germany’s psychic octopus Paul, who correctly predicted last night’s result. The bad news is that he was apparently served up on a plate after last night’s match – the good news is that he went down perfectly with the Albariño!

Back in November last year I wrote briefly about how tasting perceptions may or may not be altered by different factors – weather, barometric pressure, the cycles of the moon, etc., etc.

Perhaps back then I treated the subject with a bit of scepticism, or maybe it’s just that I’m a grumpy old man who always knows best (as Angela will readily attest to). So, in the spirit of open-mindedness I decided to put it to the test…..

Now, I must be one of Amazon’s best customers here in Galicia, so in my latest order of books and software I added the small pocket tasting guide based on Maria Thun’s biodynamic calendar, simply entitled “When wine tastes best”. I must confess that there were two things that struck me immediately – firstly, that the ‘book’ was much smaller than I imagined (when I opened the parcel I thought that they had forgotten to pack it), and secondly, how detailed it is. It does not simply give the days on which your wine might taste better, but then this is also broken down even further, indicating the actual hour!

As I write this entry Angela is travelling again, this time in Barcelona. I think that I will await her return so that we can taste together, and see if we can come to some sort of consensus over this alternative tasting theory.

This might be life changing!

Well, today is the 4th July when our American cousins celebrate the separation of the American colonies from Great Britain. The signing of the Declaration of Independence is often marked by parades, barbecues, carnivals, fairs, picnics, concerts, baseball games, family reunions, and of course, lots of fireworks.

Unlike Spain, the U.S. do not enjoy many local or national (federal) holidays, but they do at least take an additional day when the holiday falls on a weekend (in Spain the day is usually lost). In the UK many bank holidays are taken on Mondays. For example, the May Day bank holiday is rarely celebrated on May 1st, except in years when the date happens to fall on a Monday.

Whilst we are on the subject of holidays, perhaps this is a good time to mention that for the very first time in our history, the Bodega will close for a very short summer break of one week – from Monday 16th to Friday 20th August. Apart from not being here to answer the telephone, this should actually have very little effect on the service that we offer our customers. We pride ourselves in turning orders around very quickly, and so even if orders arrive during this closure period, we should be able to prepare them very quickly upon our return.

So once again, a very Happy Independence Day to all our American friends and customers!

In my previous post you can see a guy clambering over a hotel roof for the sake of his art, whereas my photographic effort today is much more modest, with feet very much on terra firma (or sand to be more precise).

Having said that, crawling across our local beach on my hands and knees at dawn this morning must have looked a bit odd to passers-by. Perhaps they thought I was a drunk, and that I had been hitting the Albariño bottle for breakfast!

Anyway, I do like to keep a current library of different bottle shots, and of course, our association with the sea makes such a setting an obvious choice for a picture. The useful thing is that the Spanish are not really what you would call ‘early morning people’ (especially after celebrating their World Cup success of the night before), and so the beach was very much deserted when the sun came up today. You can take my word for it!

Now, I consider myself to be a reasonably enthusiastic photographer, and as you have probably guessed, I also love messing about in Photoshop. Having said that, even I would draw the line at scaling a hotel roof for the sake of my art like the guy in this photo. I was pretty taken-a-back to watch him climbing like a cat across a steeply sloping tiled roof just for the sake of getting a better panorama – he must have been 30 or 40 metres above street level and appeared to be wearing just a pair of normal street shoes!

Quite how he got out onto the roof in the first place is another story, but let’s just hope that the picture he got was worth the effort.

I guess that you must be thinking that I have not posted for a few days because I’ve been glued to my TV screen watching the World Cup football. Well, that is only half true. In fact I have been in England for almost a week, where I noticed that the country appears to be consumed by World Cup fever – every other car has an England flag, and even some staff in banks and post offices are wearing England football shirts….. but then, football is not really the theme of today’s post.

Just before I left, I read an interesting article in the local press mentioning that the French have now started to plant Albariño in the Herault region, near Montpellier. It does not surprise me to learn that the Galicians were very quick to dismiss this latest development, in effect saying that they do not consider it to be a serious threat, and that the Albariño from our region will always be superior to anything that the French can produce. Quite a natural reaction I guess.

Far more worrying to me was the almost casual remark at the end of the article, which more or less said “Oh, and by the way, they are planting Albariño in New Zealand too”. New Zealand is the home of many a fantastic Riesling, and the Kiwis certainly know how to handle cool-climate white varietals down there. I expect that in the future we will face much stiffer competition from New Zealand than we will from the South of France – but then this is just my opinion.

Now here’s an interesting footnote to this story – if I take out my favourite shovel in Pontevedra, and start to dig straight down through the centre of the earth, I will eventually emerge near Greymouth on the south island of New Zealand – not too far from the heart of wine making country. Just for a bit of fun try visiting this website, and see where on the earth you would emerge. Happy digging!