In the years that I have had my car, the only damage that I have ever suffered has been caused by other people…… whilst my car has been parked! And, of course, not one person has come forward to admit any sort of liability. Door dinks, bumps and a couple of scratches, all from car parks.

At Castro Martin we are quite fortunate that when Angela’s father built the Bodega over 30 years ago, he had the foresight to include a loading area for trucks, and also a generous area for parking. Until now this was simply an open area of concrete, and parking was simply a free-for-all – you parked your car where you could squeeze it in (and with Angela around, that was never going to be the best arrangement – for vehicle safety purposes). Suffice to say that she has a bit of a reputation for bumping into things, and suffers horribly from walls and posts that have a habit of reversing out in front of her!

Anyway, after painting an exterior wall the other day, we had a bit of white paint left over, and decided to paint some ‘official’ parking bays. We have made sure that each space is very generous so that even Angela has no excuse for causing any door dinks!!

In the years that I have had my car, the only damage that I have ever suffered has been caused by other people…… whilst my car has been parked! And, of course, not one person has come forward to admit any sort of liability. Door dinks, bumps and a couple of scratches, all from car parks.

At Castro Martin we are quite fortunate that when Angela’s father built the Bodega over 30 years ago, he had the foresight to include a loading area for trucks, and also a generous area for parking. Until now this was simply an open area of concrete, and parking was simply a free-for-all – you parked your car where you could squeeze it in (and with Angela around, that was never going to be the best arrangement – for vehicle safety purposes). Suffice to say that she has a bit of a reputation for bumping into things, and suffers horribly from walls and posts that have a habit of reversing out in front of her!

Anyway, after painting an exterior wall the other day, we had a bit of white paint left over, and decided to paint some ‘official’ parking bays. We have made sure that each space is very generous so that even Angela has no excuse for causing any door dinks!!

Today will be a day of mixed emotions here in Spain, as they welcome a new King to the throne of Spain, whilst at the same time bidding farewell to their Kings of Football ‘La Roja’, unceremoniously dumped out of the World Cup by Chile. Perhaps it’s a bit disrespectful to mention the new King and a football team in the same sentence, but in the past few years football has become even more of a religion than it was before.

Yesterday in Madrid King Juan Carlos signed his final Act of Parliament, a law approving his abdication in favour of his son who will be crowned King Felipe VI in a low key ceremony today. During times of austerity in Spain it was deemed, quite correctly, to be inappropriate to have a lavish celebration. However, the centre of Madrid has still been decorated with tens of thousands of Spanish flags, and large crowds are expected to line the route between Congress and the Royal Palace to cheer the new King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia, who will then greet the nation from the Royal balcony.

In an even more low key ceremony, the Spanish football team will fly home after their final group game against Australia on Monday. The euphoria of 4 years ago, when they were crowned World Champions, long forgotten.

Today will be a day of mixed emotions here in Spain, as they welcome a new King to the throne of Spain, whilst at the same time bidding farewell to their Kings of Football ‘La Roja’, unceremoniously dumped out of the World Cup by Chile. Perhaps it’s a bit disrespectful to mention the new King and a football team in the same sentence, but in the past few years football has become even more of a religion than it was before.

Yesterday in Madrid King Juan Carlos signed his final Act of Parliament, a law approving his abdication in favour of his son who will be crowned King Felipe VI in a low key ceremony today. During times of austerity in Spain it was deemed, quite correctly, to be inappropriate to have a lavish celebration. However, the centre of Madrid has still been decorated with tens of thousands of Spanish flags, and large crowds are expected to line the route between Congress and the Royal Palace to cheer the new King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia, who will then greet the nation from the Royal balcony.

In an even more low key ceremony, the Spanish football team will fly home after their final group game against Australia on Monday. The euphoria of 4 years ago, when they were crowned World Champions, long forgotten.

With all the recent rainfall, and now a blast of hot sunshine, we have perfect conditions in our vineyards for disease. Local growers are rushing out to treat their vines before the humidity takes its toll. 

People say that the vineyards of Burgundy are fragmented, but when you examine the ‘stats’ here in Galicia, I think we can give them a good run for their money….. In our denomination there are just over 4,000 hectares (about 10,000 acres) in total. This is divided between more than 6,700 registered grape growers, meaning that the average would be about 0.6 hectares (1.5 acres), except that some people have much more than the average. For example, we have 11 hectares (27 acres), meaning that many of the smallest growers have much less than the average. And this is not the end of the story – there are some 23,400 individual vineyard sites, so you can perhaps begin to imagine how fragmented we are as a wine producing area!

Anyway, back to my original point. With such small vineyard holdings much of the work is carried out by the owners and their family, and not using any hi-tech equipment either – it’s very much a hands on regime in which everyone has to play their part. Take, for example, this young man, in today’s photo, sent out in the early morning to spray his family’s plot using just a small back pack. His protective equipment?…. A blue work coat and a motorcycle helmet. Better than nothing I guess (but only just).

With all the recent rainfall, and now a blast of hot sunshine, we have perfect conditions in our vineyards for disease. Local growers are rushing out to treat their vines before the humidity takes its toll. 

People say that the vineyards of Burgundy are fragmented, but when you examine the ‘stats’ here in Galicia, I think we can give them a good run for their money….. In our denomination there are just over 4,000 hectares (about 10,000 acres) in total. This is divided between more than 6,700 registered grape growers, meaning that the average would be about 0.6 hectares (1.5 acres), except that some people have much more than the average. For example, we have 11 hectares (27 acres), meaning that many of the smallest growers have much less than the average. And this is not the end of the story – there are some 23,400 individual vineyard sites, so you can perhaps begin to imagine how fragmented we are as a wine producing area!

Anyway, back to my original point. With such small vineyard holdings much of the work is carried out by the owners and their family, and not using any hi-tech equipment either – it’s very much a hands on regime in which everyone has to play their part. Take, for example, this young man, in today’s photo, sent out in the early morning to spray his family’s plot using just a small back pack. His protective equipment?…. A blue work coat and a motorcycle helmet. Better than nothing I guess (but only just).

Those of you who follow our site might already know my thoughts about wine competitions. I have very mixed views….. My opinion is that there are just so many variables involved that can ultimately affect the outcome.  The biggest problem can simply be how your wine performs in front of the judges. For example, it could be that you wine is recently bottled, recently sulphured, or perhaps it’s simply too young and not showing at its best. It’s position in the tasting line up can also influence how it is judged. If yours is a more subtle, elegant wine that finds itself in the middle of a selection of less subtle, more full-bodied, slightly sweeter, or perhaps even slightly more alcoholic wines, then it can quite easily be lost, or simply overpowered. The list of potential stumbling blocks goes on, so much so that in the end the result can become a bit of a lottery. Writing about a wine, offering the consumer a description and guiding them is one thing, but awarding medals based on a snapshot of how your wine shows at one precise moment in it’s life, well, that can sometimes be a bit misleading.

As a result of our frustrations with said competitions we simply chose to abstain completely from entering, but that’s not to say that our wines are never submitted. Of course it is the prerogative of our customers to decide whatever they chose to do in this respect, and of course we will always support their choice.

The other day I was surfing the internet, visiting a few wine websites (as I have been known to do on occasions), when I stumbled across a silver medal! It appears that our Bodega Castro Martin 2012 had won a silver medal at  the 2014 International Wine Challenge in London. We had no idea that it had won a prize, and didn’t even know that it had been entered – suffice to say that it came as quite a surprise…..

Those of you who follow our site might already know my thoughts about wine competitions. I have very mixed views….. My opinion is that there are just so many variables involved that can ultimately affect the outcome.  The biggest problem can simply be how your wine performs in front of the judges. For example, it could be that you wine is recently bottled, recently sulphured, or perhaps it’s simply too young and not showing at its best. It’s position in the tasting line up can also influence how it is judged. If yours is a more subtle, elegant wine that finds itself in the middle of a selection of less subtle, more full-bodied, slightly sweeter, or perhaps even slightly more alcoholic wines, then it can quite easily be lost, or simply overpowered. The list of potential stumbling blocks goes on, so much so that in the end the result can become a bit of a lottery. Writing about a wine, offering the consumer a description and guiding them is one thing, but awarding medals based on a snapshot of how your wine shows at one precise moment in it’s life, well, that can sometimes be a bit misleading.

As a result of our frustrations with said competitions we simply chose to abstain completely from entering, but that’s not to say that our wines are never submitted. Of course it is the prerogative of our customers to decide whatever they chose to do in this respect, and of course we will always support their choice.

The other day I was surfing the internet, visiting a few wine websites (as I have been known to do on occasions), when I stumbled across a silver medal! It appears that our Bodega Castro Martin 2012 had won a silver medal at  the 2014 International Wine Challenge in London. We had no idea that it had won a prize, and didn’t even know that it had been entered – suffice to say that it came as quite a surprise…..

The other day I was watching the commemoration of the D-Day landings on my news channel – celebrated on the Normandy beaches under blue skies and warm sunshine. As I looked out of my own window it was rather depressing to see the rain, falling from leaden grey skies, accompanied by a chilling wind. This is just not typical June weather. Indeed, without exaggerating, there have only been a handful of days so far this year when the daytime temperatures have exceeded 20°C (68°F). Not ideal for grape cultivation…..

In my desperation I consulted the weather forecast to see if there was any change on the horizon, and what I discovered was quite an eye opener. This week’s forecast shows a dramatic leap in temperatures, from today’s 17°C (63°F) to just over 30°C (86°F). Does this mean I can finally put my winter sweaters away?

The other day I was watching the commemoration of the D-Day landings on my news channel – celebrated on the Normandy beaches under blue skies and warm sunshine. As I looked out of my own window it was rather depressing to see the rain, falling from leaden grey skies, accompanied by a chilling wind. This is just not typical June weather. Indeed, without exaggerating, there have only been a handful of days so far this year when the daytime temperatures have exceeded 20°C (68°F). Not ideal for grape cultivation…..

In my desperation I consulted the weather forecast to see if there was any change on the horizon, and what I discovered was quite an eye opener. This week’s forecast shows a dramatic leap in temperatures, from today’s 17°C (63°F) to just over 30°C (86°F). Does this mean I can finally put my winter sweaters away?

Tomorrow we are closed for a wine festival, not as you might think for Albariño, but rather for our local red wine – Tinto de Barrantes. I have to confess that the actual legality of this wine is somewhat dubious, as I have never seen even one single labelled bottle in any shop or restaurant. Somehow the authorities seem to turn a blind eye to this fact, even allowing it to be celebrated with a street festival and declaring one day of local holiday.

The wine itself is not my favourite, although whenever we have visitors to the bodega and they have the opportunity to taste it, they seem to be quite enamoured. Personally I describe it as being something akin to a partially fermented Beaujolais, with a deep purple colour, very low alcohol, green tannins and a highly volatile acidity – not very nice….. but clearly the locals love it!

Tomorrow we are closed for a wine festival, not as you might think for Albariño, but rather for our local red wine – Tinto de Barrantes. I have to confess that the actual legality of this wine is somewhat dubious, as I have never seen even one single labelled bottle in any shop or restaurant. Somehow the authorities seem to turn a blind eye to this fact, even allowing it to be celebrated with a street festival and declaring one day of local holiday.

The wine itself is not my favourite, although whenever we have visitors to the bodega and they have the opportunity to taste it, they seem to be quite enamoured. Personally I describe it as being something akin to a partially fermented Beaujolais, with a deep purple colour, very low alcohol, green tannins and a highly volatile acidity – not very nice….. but clearly the locals love it!

This week signals our move to a summer timetable – working from 8am to 4pm, instead of the 9am to 5pm that we work in winter. Of course we are at the extreme western edge of Europe, which means that the sun rises just a little later, but on the plus side we do enjoy very long, light summer evenings (now all we need is a bit of sunshine!) However, the real reason for starting a little earlier is based around the summer heat. Clearly, we do not suffer the extreme temperatures that they do in other parts of the country, but it does at least mean that we are able to complete much of our working day in the vineyards before the mercury hits its late afternoon peak. (Note that during periods of excessive heat our vineyard guys do start at 7am).

I should also say that our bodega is fairly unique in that our working day is not split in two – as practised by many other industries around Spain. The tradition is normally to have a break of some two or three hours in the middle of the day, but for many different reasons (not least of all efficiency), we actively chose not to follow this practice.

This week signals our move to a summer timetable – working from 8am to 4pm, instead of the 9am to 5pm that we work in winter. Of course we are at the extreme western edge of Europe, which means that the sun rises just a little later, but on the plus side we do enjoy very long, light summer evenings (now all we need is a bit of sunshine!) However, the real reason for starting a little earlier is based around the summer heat. Clearly, we do not suffer the extreme temperatures that they do in other parts of the country, but it does at least mean that we are able to complete much of our working day in the vineyards before the mercury hits its late afternoon peak. (Note that during periods of excessive heat our vineyard guys do start at 7am).

I should also say that our bodega is fairly unique in that our working day is not split in two – as practised by many other industries around Spain. The tradition is normally to have a break of some two or three hours in the middle of the day, but for many different reasons (not least of all efficiency), we actively chose not to follow this practice.

There are quite a few famous broadsheet newspapers across America, some of the most well known probably include the New York Times, the L.A. Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Boston Globe. We are very happy therefore, to tell you that in the last few days we received quite a positive mention in the Chicago Tribune. When I saw it, it really made me smile, not only because we had been rated as one of a handful of “Iberian white wine to watch”, but mainly because of the review itself – short, succinct and very much to the point. Indeed, I don’t recall ever seeing a review that somehow managed to capture the essence of our wine in only three words “Lime-y and briny”…….. says it all. The review in full is as follows:

2012 Bodegas Castro Martin Albariño ‘Sobre Lias’: Lime-y and briny, so it says, “Find me shellfish or oysters, por favor“. 

It might not be the most grandiloquent review that we have ever received, but it works for me!

There are quite a few famous broadsheet newspapers across America, some of the most well known probably include the New York Times, the L.A. Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Boston Globe. We are very happy therefore, to tell you that in the last few days we received quite a positive mention in the Chicago Tribune. When I saw it, it really made me smile, not only because we had been rated as one of a handful of “Iberian white wine to watch”, but mainly because of the review itself – short, succinct and very much to the point. Indeed, I don’t recall ever seeing a review that somehow managed to capture the essence of our wine in only three words “Lime-y and briny”…….. says it all. The review in full is as follows:

2012 Bodegas Castro Martin Albariño ‘Sobre Lias’: Lime-y and briny, so it says, “Find me shellfish or oysters, por favor“. 

It might not be the most grandiloquent review that we have ever received, but it works for me!

The scape crappers of New York (click to enlarge)

Now, I’m the last person that has the right to mock my wife’s English. I’m ashamed to admit that my Spanish is so poor that I still don’t know my ‘month’ from my ‘table’ (sometimes confusing ‘mes’ and ‘mesa’ when I speak Spanish}.

Last night we were watching a programme on TV about the construction of tall buildings (probably Discovery Channel) when Angela suddenly started talking about ‘scape crappers’. Of course she meant skyscrapers – all the right letters, but just arranged in the wrong order!!! I nearly choked on my drink…..

The scape crappers of New York (click to enlarge)

Now, I’m the last person that has the right to mock my wife’s English. I’m ashamed to admit that my Spanish is so poor that I still don’t know my ‘month’ from my ‘table’ (sometimes confusing ‘mes’ and ‘mesa’ when I speak Spanish}.

Last night we were watching a programme on TV about the construction of tall buildings (probably Discovery Channel) when Angela suddenly started talking about ‘scape crappers’. Of course she meant skyscrapers – all the right letters, but just arranged in the wrong order!!! I nearly choked on my drink…..

Over recent months I have been a little critical of some of our local food festivals. Not so much the festivals themselves, but rather the advertising, and more specifically the photography. Of course food is notoriously difficult to photograph, indeed, it requires very specialised techniques. We all know how our rather dull, flaccid looking fast food burger can be transformed into something juicy and wholly appetising on the advertising boards. The people who prepare these shots are the foody equivalent of professional make-up artists – lifting, tweaking, plumping, colouring and generally preening the dish before it appears in front on the lens.

Today I was quite relieved to finally see advertising for a local food festival that had clearly employed such professional  food stylists to shoot their pictures. The local town of Caldas de Reis is celebrating their fourth annual festival of Tapas. Their publicity shot shows a nicely prepared tapas dish, albeit that I have no idea what the dish actually is. At least it looks quite appetising which is more than I can say for the plate of zorza that looked more like cat food (in my post of last October).

Over recent months I have been a little critical of some of our local food festivals. Not so much the festivals themselves, but rather the advertising, and more specifically the photography. Of course food is notoriously difficult to photograph, indeed, it requires very specialised techniques. We all know how our rather dull, flaccid looking fast food burger can be transformed into something juicy and wholly appetising on the advertising boards. The people who prepare these shots are the foody equivalent of professional make-up artists – lifting, tweaking, plumping, colouring and generally preening the dish before it appears in front on the lens.

Today I was quite relieved to finally see advertising for a local food festival that had clearly employed such professional  food stylists to shoot their pictures. The local town of Caldas de Reis is celebrating their fourth annual festival of Tapas. Their publicity shot shows a nicely prepared tapas dish, albeit that I have no idea what the dish actually is. At least it looks quite appetising which is more than I can say for the plate of zorza that looked more like cat food (in my post of last October).