My Month in Portugal ... random thoughts

[Eric Ifune]

And I thought you were there to work!

[Andy Velebil]

Roy
Only 56 at one sitting? You're obviously slacking and having way too much fun. Back to work you must go Ok ok just kidding. Keep up the good work

[Roy Hersh]

Saturday was spent taking care of some personal business and then another round of 13 tasted blind.

That lineup consisted of:

Vesuvio
Quinta Valle Longo
Quinta Seara D'Ordens
Quinta do Noval Nacional
Quinta do Retiro Novo
Rozes
Quinta de Roriz
Quinta do Sagrado
Ferreira
Capela da Quinta Vesuvio (how it appeared on the hand typed label)
Alves de Sousa
Krohn
Sandeman

That evening, it was time to get in a tux for the first time in ... well, a long time, and head to the 2013 Confraria do Vinho do Porto's Enthronizacão Ceremony at the Palacio da Bolsa. As mentioned ad nauseum, this was my 10th anniversary and there was no way I was going to miss this and even without the 2011's being released at this time, I would have made the trip over for solely this event.

Who did I run into outside the Bolsa, but Gustavo all duded up. For the 2nd day in a row, the whole Port trade was together and it was fun to see. Gustavo and I sat together and watched as the somewhat somber ceremony unfolded. George Sandeman opened up the ceremony with a speech in Portuguese. There were many new additions to the Confraria and I noted a few familiar faces; most notably Rute Monteiro from Noval who entered in as EXPERTOS, a class only held by those in the trade. There were a few others that I recognized in that short list of 11, but the "Mestres" only included three this year. The Cavaleiros (journos, overseas trade etc.) included a well deserved George dos Santos, and also Martine Saunier (the only "American" although she is actually from France) who was the long time importer for Niepoort, and Sarah Ahmed who needs no introduction ... along with a supporting cast of another 33 individuals, if I remember correctly. Fun to watch and it brought back great memories and was the first time I've worn my tambuladeira since '03.

After the pomp and circumstance ended, we marched over to the old Edificio da Alfandaega do Porto which translates loosely to the old Custom's House, behind a group of white horses and marching band in full regalia. Out on the back patio, the festivities began with an hour long Douro-side cocktail hour with Port tonics and other such drinks, along with all types of petiscoes. Everyone from the Confraria, IVDP, AEVP and owners, winemakers and key execs of the trade were all invited and seemingly almost all were in attendance, with some noted exceptions. Anyway, it was a grand party atmosphere and wonderful to meet the Danish Port Wine Club members and President in person after many an email over the years. As we all filtered into the main hall where there were about 30 tables of twelve guests. I went over to congratulate Rute and then finally had the opportunity to meet Sarah Ahmed in person and introduced myself. As nice in person as I had expected from her writing and emails, someone I've long enjoyed reading and especially as her penchant for Portuguese wine has augmented. Dinner itself was a multicourse affair with nice regional wines and Port too. The white was a 2012 Quinta Casa Amarela Vinho Branco. The reds paired with the main part of the meal, (I won't bore you with the menu) were: 2011 Dalva Tinto Reserva and a nice 2010 Quinta do Passadouro Tinto.

The dessert was worth waiting for, as I had never seen the 20 year old Tawny Port produced by the Confraria do Vinho do Porto. I've had the 1982 and earlier this year the 1983, but this was a first and I didn't even know they made Tawny.

Dancing and congrats continued and I cut out ... yep, to do another round of the aforementioned 13 bottles of 2011.

[Roy Hersh]

Sunday was São João festival day and I was invited to private parties and some fun places to watch the fireworks, but decided to keep it simple.

I woke up early to start a new batch of 13 bottles and was faster than normal as I had an early lunch appointment that day and was finished by 11 a.m. in a record time of 2 hours. I had plans to lunch with Luisa Borges and her boyfriend Jorge at their favorite seafood restaurant by the sea,M argariada in Leça da Palmeira. It doesn't get any more authentic than this. We walked through and alley way and past two men and their dog, sitting in front of some smokin' hot charcoal grills; which was where all of the grilled seafood was cooked for inside what I was about to enter. The restaurant is quaint, with old wooden tables set up family style for groups of 4 - 12 people/table. The staff were the owners and their family members and the place held about 50, but was empty as we arrived before noon. That changed in a hurry as what was a quiet family place on an early Sunday afternoon, quickly turned into a loud and bustling local eatery. Mostly large Portuguese families. The 3 of us all had this incredible dish called, "açorda de camarão" ... but it was huge and consisted of a LARGE round loaf of fantabulous fresh baked bread, stuffed with freshly sauteed shrimp and thick broth/sauce almost like a stew ... it was to die for and I knew that I was going to walk this off in a big way, but still only had about half of it. I tried Luisa's latest red wine and for dessert a new LBV which was stellar. It was great to see her and Jorge and catch up with what is new and I am psyched that we will finally visit her family's properties during this year's Port Harvest Tour. As we were leaving, Jorge's parents arrived and so he stayed behind while Luisa dropped me back off at my home away from home.

I had planned to get some serious exercise in and was going to skip my night time tasting of 13, so that I could enjoy the festival for the very first time! A friend met me here and she is a young historian and expert on the city of Porto. She promised to school me in some Portuguese history going back to Dom Joao and his two sons who would be kings, Pedro (good) and Miguel (evil), but I'll spare you the details, that I was "forced" to remember. The quiz came later. We walked from 15h00 to the confluence of the Douro and the Atlantic ocean on the Porto side, then took a boat across the Douro to the fishing village, Afurada, on the Gaia side of the river. Coincidentally, I had not been in this incredibly anachronistic village since having dinner at the home of Dan and Shannon Carbon (he was the Dir. of Marketing before Henri Sizaret, who preceded Eliana) at SFE. Although still quite early, you could tell the village was getting ready for a major fun time. We then walked along the oceanfront, 12 km more almost to the big city to the south (I believe it is Espinha) which took hours but was one of the best things I've ever done in Portugal.

I had never been this far out on that side of the river and all of it was passing by crashing waves worthy of expert surfers and in other sections some massive rock formations too. We passed several beautiful villages and an occasional eatery, stopped for a beer, later for a bottle of water and continued on, passed a naturally preserved estuary that was beautiful and filled with noisy gulls. Great photo taking along the way. It was about 28 degrees and ultra-sunny and had been quite warm in Porto, but along the ocean the breeze kept things really cool. Unfortunately for me, I did not put on sunscreen and was not wearing a hat, but I won't make that mistake again.

By the time we walked all the way back to Gaia it was 11:30 at night, only stopping on the way back in Afurada to refill our water bottles and take some photos of the neighborhood grilling big freshly caught sardines and other fish. As my friend has done this before in training for the Porto marathon, she knew we had covered 27-28 km in all. Finally back in Gaia proper, we started a late dinner, and just as our entrees arrived, so did the festival fireworks. The restaurant emptied out and we ventured across the street to the cais and had the perfect view of both sets of the fireworks, including the "waterfall" effect cascading partially down the side of the Dom Luis bridge and then returned back inside to finish eating. That wa a bit odd as we literally just left the restaurant along with all other patrons.

An absolutely perfect morning, afternoon and night to spend my 1st time here for the festival. Walking off a few calories ... priceless!

[Roy Hersh]

On to Monday, my last day of fun before our tour begins on Friday. Working in two tasting sessions was a must, even knowing that I'd be gone the majority of the day, into night.

I was happy to wake up without any ill affects from about 17 miles of walking the previous day, except I was rather fried from the sun. I went across the hall and began my tasting and that particular flight was the best I've encountered so far. Really some stunning bottlings of 2011 in that grouping. I have someone to cut foils, remove corks and place the bottles in my numbered bags which keeps things beyond reproach. Nearly three hours on these 13 bottles and that's been the average time per flight so far.

After a shower and major tooth brushing I walked over to Gaia, and it felt great to stretch my legs again. Today's event: the Barco Rabellos Race. I arrived in time to take some great "before" photos and the cais continued to fill with locals and tourists alike. A real party atmosphere and just after the Sao Joao, but in actuality, this was just a continuation.

I was on the Sandeman barco and so was Tom A. ("Uncle Tom") and his buddy, my good friend Ligia Marques, Chris Sandeman and his Swedish girlfriend Kaisa, Michael (winner of the London WSET contest), George Sandeman and the crew. Once on board and heading out to the starting line, on a very hot and sunny day again (thank you Ligia for the sunscreen!) the "consumption in moderation" began with Mateus Rose. Yes, I'll admit it, I've never tasted Mateus Rose before and although as a stock boy in a wine shop in Douglaston (Queens) NY, from 17-19 years of age, I put boatloads of Mateus from box to shelf ... this was a new experience. I'd heard that back then in the mid-1970's it was a rather sweet style of wine. Not anymore, this was like a Rose version of Vinho Verde and actually rather delicious, seriously folks, no joke! I mean here I am on a barco rabellos in the middle of the Douro between Gaia and Porto passing under a bridge that was born in 1963 and heading to the starting line for the race on a sunny afternoon ... what could be better? Mateus Rose was an unexpected fine wine served in proper fluted stemware and it really hit the spot. Next up a bottle that Tom A. brought along which was a treat: a 1940 White Colheita from a producer unfamiliar (was it Couchao) or something like that.

By this time we were sitting around and waiting for the judges to show up, which was REALLY bad that they were late for the start of the race. Several of the boats started to drift over towards the Afurada fishing village, or more aptly the Marina nearby. That too was bad as the tide change was happening at that very time and it was wreaking havoc with several of the boats including the Sandeman craft. George was not a happy camper and was letting his crew and our tow boat crew know and we saw other barcos in even greater peril. The Malvedos had a broken mast, the Dow and Ferreira barcos were adrift and facing the wrong way, things were not looking good for many of the 16 craft.

However, most of their crews were able to get these issues sorted out by the time the judges did arrive and shortly thereafter, the green flag and the beginning of the race. We were sideways at that point and things were getting uglier by the moment. As we drifted to the south and the best path and wind were along the north side of the Douro, we were doomed from the start. Meanwhile I was having fun correcting Tom as to which was the Port side of the boat. That being said, his generosity was very much appreciated as it was nice to have some Port before the race began.

What we didn't know was that the Ferreira boat had to be towed and it was only a hundred feet away from us. As soon as your Barco is towed, you are immediately disqualified from the competition. But that wasn't so bad, s the boat that was towing them had someone who was not the sharpest tool in the shed and at full speed he crashed the Ferreira on our starboard side of our barco and sent lots of wine and people flying, but none overboard. Chris Sandeman was not amused and most of us had only seconds of warning before the collision and this was no small crash. I was very close to the point of impact and thought the wood hull had cracked but was fortunately incorrect. George reminded me that these hulls were designed to bounce off of the rocks in the white water of the upper Douro river in its wilder days.

Well as poor as the Ferreira team's sailors were, ours were even less skilled and all I can say is, "poor George". He eventually gave up and told his tow boat to bring us into the middle of the river and they couldn't even get that right for about 10 minutes. Nonetheless, we finally had the sail go up properly and it filled and we were off. Of course we were dead last and had been DQ'd as soon as we were towed, so being the gentleman that Mr. Sandeman is, he played it very fairly and we rode in from the back of the pack to ensure we did not get in the way of any boats that were still in contention. We received a round of applause for being last in, but all was in good spirits and by that point we were well into the bottles of the Founder's Reserve.

A great Portuguese band was playing in front of the Sandeman Lodge and people were dancing under a huge tent. It was over 30 degrees C. and rather humid too, (supposedly 37 degrees in Douro earlier in the week) and it was brutal being back in the sun. The Confraria members (there must be one member on every Barco in costume) came together for another ceremony in front of the lodge and I was looking for a bottle of water and came back to take a few photos. The party continued and a few beers flowed (fortunately cooling things down a bit) and we headed inside and George gave yet another speech in Portuguese as the Port trade was there in numbers. What a party atmosphere and every person who was out on the river on the 16 barcos and their family's were at the dinner. It was quite an affair and lots of nice Ports were being poured too. Axel had a 1964 White Colheita by Krohn, Tom opened a 1966 Dow which was a stunning bottle at its best and we had 40 year old Tawny by Sandeman too.

It was great to see Bartholomew Broadbent in Portugal for the first time we have ever been here together at the same time. It was he in 1994, that arranged for me to be hosted by James Symington (Rupert's 2nd year in the trade) and without his help back then, I likely would not be writing this at nearly 4:30 in the morning. In all seriousness, it was great to hang out with one of my best friends, in Porto of all places!

Guess what I did at the end of the dinner?

Correctamundo!!!

Back to my tasting room for another round of 13.

I can now cut to the chase. From Tues. a.m. through what was Wed. night, I never left the building and the vast majority of it was spent in front of bottles of 2011 Vintage Port. Earler, I had dinner with a gal who works here where I am staying; and we dined at a restaurant that appeared in FTLOP's listing by the Port trade as one of their favorites.

Basically, it was a great tapas restaurant with small plates of incredibly prepared Portuguese meat, seafood, cheese, olives, various bacalhau preparations (I skipped ordering the tripe!) and it all went down well with a bottle of Vertice and some wonderful inexpensive non-descript Douro red that they do by the glass. The name of the restaurant escapes me, but I would go back there again tomorrow night and just might do that. Now, after fully catching up and with my tastings too, it is time for some well deserved sleep.

[Bradley Bogdan]

Great play by play of the trip, please keep it coming!

[Tom Archer]

hopefully the bottles were tasted for TCA before being put into a travelling glass.

Err.. No.

For some reason, most of the guests were served an anonymous young VP that emerged from the back of the room, and not from the giant glass. After drinking that offering, I took my glass forward and asked for a shot from the giant blend, with several others following suit.

Compared to the individual wines, the blend seemed very approachable, which was strange.

The 56 wine blind tasting was indeed a marathon. There simply wasn't time to write an essay on each one, so I graded each wine in schoolteacher fashion on nose, intensity and mouthfeel, spitting and drinking water between each wine, - and consuming a full two litres of water during the session..

I then totted my scores from each flight before taking tiny sips (which I swallowed) to gain a more holistic take on the wines, and then adjusted my scores accordingly.

When the flights were changed, I retained some reference glasses to ensure my scoring didn't drift during the session.

Once the blind session was over, we were given cards that identified what the wines were, - and the surprises emerged..

A very good showing from the Douro Boys and the other independents, which echoed my observations at the BFT in London earlier this year, and some giant slaying by some old names that have hitherto been better known for their wood ports - Burmester and Dalva in particular.

My top wine from this session was Crasto, with Passadouro a very close second. Graham Stone Terraces came third, with Vesuvio Capela and Burmester sharing fourth position.

Quality overall was excellent - I don't think the words 'Oh dear' entered my mind once during the session.

Biggest disappointment was that neither Taylor nor Noval had the courage to submit their super cuvees to this, most eminent, of blind tastings..

[Jeff G.]

: a 1940 White Colheita from a producer unfamiliar (was it Couchao) or something like that.

quinta do cachao of caves messia?

how was it?

i recall the 77 making my eyes twitch

[Tom Archer]

a 1940 White Colheita from a producer unfamiliar (was it Couchao) or something like that

Cork was branded: 'Porto Cabral'

[Tom Archer]

Meanwhile I was having fun correcting Tom as to which was the Port side of the boat

Yep - I had a brief 'senior' moment there..

The Malvedos had a broken mast

Broken spar, I think - masts are the bits that stick upright - spars are horizontal..

[Andy Velebil]

Meanwhile I was having fun correcting Tom as to which was the Port side of the boat

Yep - I had a brief 'senior' moment there..

The Malvedos had a broken mast

Broken spar, I think - masts are the bits that stick upright - spars are horizontal..

Tom
Any part of the boat where someone is holding the bottle of Port you want more of is the "port side" :)

[Moses Botbol]

Tom
Any part of the boat where someone is holding the bottle of Port you want more of is the "port side" :)

When I was in my early 20's, I was a 1st mate on a yacht. I remembered port side as being "I like port and I am left handed".

[Andy Velebil]

Tom
Any part of the boat where someone is holding the bottle of Port you want more of is the "port side" :)

When I was in my early 20's, I was a 1st mate on a yacht. I remembered port side as being "I like port and I am left handed".

I used the "P" comes before "S" and Left comes before Right method as a little kid

[Glenn E.]

Tom
Any part of the boat where someone is holding the bottle of Port you want more of is the "port side" :)

When I was in my early 20's, I was a 1st mate on a yacht. I remembered port side as being "I like port and I am left handed".

I used the "P" comes before "S" and Left comes before Right method as a little kid

Port and Left are the shorter words.

[Tom Archer]

If you add harbour lights into the equation, "I have no red port left " is a useful aide memoire - although in my case, it is somewhat detached from reality..

[Frederick Blais]

Just a quick word to say it was nice meeting Roy and a few other participants of the Forum at the 2011 World Presentation. I'll try to write up a bit about this later. I had a very bad day coming back, as my flight got delayed both in Porto and Lisbon because of the general strike in the country.

I was really impress by this 2011 declaration organization. The quality of the wines, the chance to meet the producers and the ceremony!

[Tom Archer]

I was really impress by this 2011 declaration organization. The quality of the wines, the chance to meet the producers and the ceremony!

Yes, a very well managed event.

[Mark L]

Alas, I rowed in college, which sadly has thrown me off ever since (when rowing you are facing backward and everything is reversed). All I know is that I used to row port, and now I drink it!

Roy and Tom, sounds like you are having a wonderful time! We are all living vicariously through your forum entries! Thank you for sharing.

[Glenn E.]

When I was in my early 20's, I was a 1st mate on a yacht. I remembered port side as being "I like port and I am left handed".

I used the "P" comes before "S" and Left comes before Right method as a little kid

Port and Left are the shorter words.

"I have no red port left " is a useful aide memoire

As is red.

[Bradley Bogdan]

Roy, can you comment on whether a 2011 Tuke & Holdsworth is part of your lineup?