Happy news, that Marterella Winery reopened its tasting room this past weekend.  Kate Marterella won her case and received a   ruling from the Virginia Supreme Court in her dispute with the Bellevue Landowners’ Council.  That decision was handed down on 11 May 2012 by the Virginia Supreme Court.

The winery is in a rural subdivision called Bellevue Farms, governed by a homeowners association.  Covenants in the association’s governing documents require that any commercial activity on the property required the approval of a committee.  Jerry and Kate Marterella, the founders of Marterella Winery, had argued that the rules expressly permitted agriculture (with the assumption that operating a tasting room is part of that bundle of rights), and since another winery called Mediterranean Cellars already operated literally across the road, they reasonably expected approval and made a substantial investment in their winery and tasting room.  The Bellevue Landowners’ Council disagreed, and in 2008 sued to shut them down.

The case went to court in 2009, and a jury found in the favor of the Marterellas, but the judge, Fauquier County Circuit Court Judge Jeffrey W. Parker, set asided the verdict and entered in favor of the Bellevue Landowners’ Council and awarded the Council more than $100,000 in attorney’s fees, effectively shutting down their business.  A story in The Washington Post noted that in reinstating the verdict, the Virginia Supreme Court wrote that

The jury had been charged with determining whether the homeowners association’s statements permitted the winery with a tasting room, whether the Marterellas relied on those statements in starting their business, and whether they incurred expense based on that, according to the Supreme Court ruling. “Nothing in the jury instructions required the jury to find that the Marterellas’ interpretation of the word ‘agriculture’ was reasonable,” or that other decisions they made were reasonable, the ruling says; that standard was ‘injected’ by the trial court.

The Supreme Court ruling reinstates the jury verdict and reverses Judge Parker’s decision and voids the award of legal fees.  What does that mean for the Landowner’s Council?  Kate informed us that it means they are responsible for her legal fees, which are in the range of $400,000, plus paying their own legal fees which are now in excess of $150,000.  Getting an award of fees is not the same as collecting, so the association will likely have to look to its members to pay these onerous bills.

The root of Judge Parker’s reason for setting aside the jury verdict goes to that interpretation of “agriculture” and in this instance, the question of whether agricultural activity at a farm includes the sale of the finished product.  The answer, mercifully, is “yes.”  Had they gone the other way and sided with Judge Parker’s interpretation, the case could have opened up a host of deviltry by neighbors who take issue with tasting rooms everywhere.  The Bellvue Landowners’ Council’s attorney characterized Marterella as a “tavern;” other jurisdictions take issue with traffic and seek to restrict them in the name of public safety.  While this decision is great news for farm wineries and gives greater clarity to the definition of “agriculture”, we must still remain vigilant and cognizant that we all need to be good neighbors.  We’ve explored this issue of control of winery activities before in posts about zoning controversies in Fauquier and Albemarle Counties, and in Santa Barbara County, California.

After that long, difficult and expensive battle, its a bittersweet victory for Kate Marterella, after prevailing in her case against the — Homeowners Association and losing her husband Jerry to Melanoma on 23 April 2012, just weeks prior to the decision being handed down.  In his memory you can donate to the Marterella Melanoma Foundation.

All of the news stories we saw reported that the winery planned to re-open its tasting room on Memorial Day Weekend.  We stopped to see Kate that day, and the place was bustling.  Show your support and stop by — but call first; their website isn’t live, and every online resource still announces that they are closed.  The only place we’ve found confirmation is on Facebook, so check there first.

Marterella Winery, 8278 Falcon Glen Road, Warrenton, Virginia 20186 (540) 347.1119

A few weeks ago Adrian Higgins wrote in The Washington Post about an elaborate classically inspired garden in Orange County, Virginia, at a place called Mount Sharon that the owners were opening to the public the weekend of Mother’s Day.  The closing paragraph was quite striking:

I too like the urn terrace, whose floor of turf and walls of hedge bring the eye to the plump and ornate stone urn held like a Faberge egg in its space.  But the power here is in the crafting of the void, the negative space around the urn.  It brings home the idea that Mount Sharon is, at heart, about sculpting the air.

The poetic phrase “sculpting the air” reminded us of a place we saw in Portugal a few weeks ago, where long dead artists sculpted ground under a magical garden into the very antithesis of this notion at the gardens at the Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, Portugal.

The Quinta da Regaleira

Sintra is a Romantic, strange and mysterious place, with its palaces and palm trees dotting the mountains.  On our second day in Sintra we visited the Quinta da Regaleira, the summer residence of the family of Antonio Augusto de Carvalho Monteiro (1848-1920), who acquired the property in 1893 and commenced an elaborate building scheme unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.  Antonio Augusto de Carvalho Monteiro was a capitalist born in Rio de Janiero — a graduate in law from the University of Coimbra, he was a distinguished bibliophile, collector and philanthropist.  The main house is in the French neo-gothic style, designed by theatrical designer Luigi Manini (1848-1936), who also designed the extensive gardens beginning in 1898.  They worked together for 12 years.

The garden is ambitious, and it succeeds.  Even the most rudimentary garden is an expression of man’s dominion over nature, and ironically when they aren’t maintained, its laughable how quickly nature reclaims it, but this garden was conceived as the representation of the Cosmos, with imagery depicting the quest for paradise and mundus inferus, the metaphysical quest for being.

Imagine Dante’s Inferno, as Dante followed Ariadne’s thread so one can make the way back from the underworld.  Each garden feature is a stop on the initiate’s journey along the way to the vera peregrinatio mundi where you are to experience the Harmony of the Spheres.  The gardens present the metaphysical quest for enlightenment that is found in the great epics.  Symbolic objects throughout incorporate refences to Greek mythology, the works of Virgil, Dante, Milton and Luís de Camões.  It doesn’t stop there, for it also includes references to the mission of the Knights Templar (who, according to legend, were the keepers of the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant; the order was disbanded in the 14th century) and its successor order in Portugal, The Order of Christ; and the writings and work of great mystics and magicians, such as the alchemical treatise, Ars Magna by Ramon Llul (1232-1315).  Heady stuff.

Close to the house are several formal gardens; one, called the Promenade of the Gods, is an avenue linking the Pisoes Loggia to the main house and features statues of classical gods such as Fortune, Orpheus, Venus, Flora, Ceres, Zeus and the like.  From there the garden reveals itself as one explores an increasingly confounding series of mysterious places.

The most striking feature in the garden is the most diabolical, one hidden from view — the Initiatic Well, a subterranean tower that sinks 99 feet into the earth but is open to the sky and ringed by a monumental spiral stairway, along which are 22 niches that symbolize the 22 major Arcana of the Tarot.  A series of tunnels link this space to other features in the garden: the Unfinished Well, the Lake of the Waterfall, the Grotto of the East, and the Portal of the Guardians.  This last entrance fronts on a ceremonial plaza defined by twin towers and a fountain, directly opposite the Terrace of the Celestial Worlds.

Boca do Inferno — The Mouth of Hell

The afternoon before we stopped to see another mysterious place near Sintra at Caiscais, where we visited the Boca do Inferno — “the Mouth of Hell,” a site renowned for the otherworldly, booming noise that rises from the waves as the the water crashes into the rocks.  We spied a small white plaque mounted on rock that referenced Aleister Crowley and the Portuguese poet, Fernando Pessoa — there was no English translation, but we noted the word “suicido.”

This is an intriguing and obscure find, and after some research learned that the mystic and occultist Aleister Crowley, an early 20th century mystic and occultist (some think he was a madman) had visited the place and created a scandal.  In 1930 Crowley visited Mr Pessoa in Portugal, and Pessoa helped Crowley the fake his own suicide, which included a suicide note left at the Boca do Inferno.  Pessoa even told the press that he’d seen Aleister Crowley’s ghost the day after his supposed suicide, when Crowley was actually in Spain enjoying the media scandal his prank generated.

Crowley is best known today as the creator of a Tarot deck he called The Book of Thoth; he designed them, but the images were painted by Lady Frieda Harris between 1938 and 1943.  The deck remains in print.  Like the garden at the Quinta da Regaleira, it incorporates symbols from every conceivable tradition.  Given his interests, one would expect Crowley to be drawn to a place called Boca do Inferno.  It’s a shame that Montiero died 10 years prior to Crowley’s visit to Sintra; had they met, no doubt they would have had a lot to talk about.

Berry Hill. There are lots of Berry Hills in Virginia — there’s a vineyard and winery of that name in Flint Hill (they have a great disclaimer on their website: “WARNING: Continued consumption of wine may lead to sophistication, cultural awareness, worldly concerns, youthful ambiance and possibly severe happiness”); a town near the North Carolina line; there’s a Berry Hill Road in Orange, but on Sunday last we were at the Berry Hill Resort in South Boston for a meeting of the Southern Virginia Wine Trail Association. The resort is housed in in one of the finest Antebellum Greek Revival houses in America, the majestic Berry Hill, built by James Coles Bruce (1806-1865), who began construction in 1833.

Mr Bruce was devised the property by his father, James Bruce (1763-1837), who had purchased it from Isaac Coles; the mansion is actually an addition to the existing Coles house. Mr Bruce is said to have been helped with the plans John E. Johnson, the great architect of the Gothic period who later designed Staunton Hill for his half-brother Charles Bruce.

Said to be modeled after the Parthenon, the Doric portico features a perfectly proportioned pediment on eight massive brick columns that have been stuccoed and fluted. The walls are three feet thick and also stuccoed (with the exception of the rear wall), believed to be part of the original house. Granite for the floor and steps of the portico and the window sills came from the plantation quarry; the stone used for door frame was imported from Georgia.

The mansion is flanked by the plantation office and the school room, four-columned miniatures of the “big house” that face each other across the wide, circular drive. They, too, are original, having been built in 1770, and remodeled.

The entrance hall features a breathtaking pair of floating stairs that curve along the walls and meet on the second story. Behind the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a fireplace on axis with the door, though now it is used as a billiard room. To the left of the hall is a pair of drawing rooms, both having impressive deep Greek Revival cornices decorated with water leaf moldings. The drawing rooms also contain fine marble Empire-style mantels with caryatid supports.

When you visit Southern Virginia, there is no better headquarters for a tour of the SoVA Wine Trail. The resort includes two restaurants, Carrington’s (reservations recommended) and Darby’s Tavern (no reservation required), which happily serves lunch on Saturdays. But those aren’t the only amenities, which include tennis, hiking, biking, fishing, horseback riding and hayrides; an indoor pool and high-end European-style spa; and weekend wine-tasting and cooking packages. Nearby are two other fine restaurants, Molasses Grill in Halifax and and Bistro 1888 in South Boston. One can have quite a sophisticated culinary weekend there.

Last Friday we appeared with a number of other wineries at TasteCamp 2012, which was organized by Lenn Thompson, executive editor of the New York Cork Report and our own Frank Morgan, author of the widely read wine blog, Drink What You Like.  The event gathers journalists and bloggers in a region that is new to them, they taste as much wine as possible and speak to as many winemakers as possible over the course of a weekend.  It’s a great way for these writers to explore little known regions — that is, not known well outside of their immediate vicinity.  This year’s event was in Northern Virginia and included visits to wineries in Loudoun County and Fauquier County.

We arrived to find a ring of tables with black tablecloths arranged in a square on the crush pad; meanwhile the participants were finishing lunch in the tank room.  A few of our colleagues had already arrived and set up.   It was fun to see a few friends we’ve met the last couple of years, such as the duo behind Sip, Swirl, Snark and Paul and Warren of Virginia Wine Time, and of course Frank Morgan, whose very thorough piece included our comments, which you can read here.

It’s an interesting title: TasteCamp.  The organizers liken the event to going away to camp as one did as a child, but the conjunction of the two words raises other questions, such as what, exactly, is “taste”?  One way to look at it is as the simple act of tasting (wine); Camp is another matter.  This post started in a different direction but the title called for something more, for when we wrote it we were reminded of an intellectual hero of ours, the late Susan Sontag (1933-2004), whose essays, novels, short stories, plays and films from the 1960s until her death in 2004 helped define our cultural landscape.  An early essay called Notes on Camp created a sensation when it appeared in The Partisan Review, and it was included in a collection of essays she published in 1966, called Against Interpretation, which remains in print.    Notes on Camp consists primarily of a series of numbered observations attempting to define the camp aesthetic.

Though I am speaking about sensibility only — and about a sensibility that, among other things, converts the serious into the frivolous — these are grave matters. Most people think of sensibility or taste as the realm of purely subjective preferences, those mysterious attractions, mainly sensual, that have not been brought under the sovereignty of reason. They allow that considerations of taste play a part in their reactions to people and to works of art. But this attitude is naïve. And even worse. To patronize the faculty of taste is to patronize oneself. For taste governs every free — as opposed to rote — human response. Nothing is more decisive. There is taste in people, visual taste, taste in emotion – and there is taste in acts, taste in morality. Intelligence, as well, is really a kind of taste: taste in ideas. (One of the facts to be reckoned with is that taste tends to develop very unevenly. It’s rare that the same person has good visual taste and good taste in people and taste in ideas.)

Taste has no system and no proofs. But there is something like a logic of taste: the consistent sensibility which underlies and gives rise to a certain taste. A sensibility is almost, but not quite, ineffable. Any sensibility which can be crammed into the mold of a system, or handled with the rough tools of proof, is no longer a sensibility at all. It has hardened into an idea . . .

One observation Ms Sontag makes about “Camp” describes the playful side of the aesthetic:

41. The whole point of Camp is to dethrone the serious. Camp is playful, anti-serious. More precisely, Camp involves a new, more complex relation to “the serious.” One can be serious about the frivolous, frivolous about the serious.

Dethrone the serious: this is one way to look at certain bloggers, who through their exploration and study of wine and writing about their experiences dethrone the established, mainstream press and let loose on the world a flood of words and ideas about wine.  Their experience — their sensibility — their taste.  This is why wineries will not ignore the wine blogger, because they represent an entirely new way of reaching a public with an interest in wine that follows the blogger’s exploits.

So when we were invited to participate at one of the event’s Grand Tastings (there were two), we wasted no time make arrangements to be there.  We chose to participate in the first — not only was it better for us logistically, but also because it afforded an opportunity to visit Boxwood Winery outside of Middleburg.  Boxwood’s building is the work of Hugh Newell Jacobsen, a Washington, DC-based architect.   We’ve always wanted to see it, and having your own wine business leaves little time for visiting that of others.  The plan for the building is deceptively simple, and very elegant.  On an axis with the entry and its reception room is the room with the fermentation tanks, and beyond that the crush pad; on a cross-axis is the case goods storage building linked with a glass breezeway on one side and the very elegant barrel room on the other.  It is truly a work of art.  Ms Sontag summarizes its effect perfectly:

35. Ordinarily we value a work of art because of the seriousness and dignity of what it achieves. We value it because it succeeds – in being what it is and, presumably, in fulfilling the intention that lies behind it. We assume a proper, that is to say, straightforward relation between intention and performance . . .

You can view an online tour of the building here.

Last Saturday errands took us to Clarksville, a town just 25 miles south of Annefield.  We owed a delivery to one of our favorite retailers, The Galleria on the Lake on Virginia Avenue in downtown Clarksville.  The shop is more art gallery than retail store, but among the offerings is a good selection of Virginia wine, and the space devoted to wine appears to grow larger and larger with each visit.  The owner, Linda Davenport, is in large measure responsible for our success at the annual Clarksville Lake Country Wine Festival each April — many of her customers told us that they first learned of us from her, purchased from her shop and had to have more.

Clarksville should be better known, but does a good job promoting itself as Virginia’s only “lakeside town.”   The lake came in 1952, when Buggs Island Lake was created to provide hydroelectric power and drinking water to cities downstream.  Today Clarksville has the persona of a resort, with numerous vacation houses with the requisite boat slips lining the lake.  It really is idyllic.  A leisurely drive into the hills surrounding the town reveals grand old houses sprinkled among the newer arrivals with boat slips and bass boats.

The fishing is phenomenal.  The damming of the Roanoke River created a 50,000 acre lake, the largest in Virginia.  Virginians call the lake Buggs Island Lake, after an island downstream named for an early settler, Samuel Bugg. North Carolinians call it Kerr Lake, after John H. Kerr, the North Carolina legislator who pushed through the legislation authorizing the dam that created it.  Take your pick — both names appear to be used with equal frequency. It seems fitting, because the lake is an impoundment of another geographic feature with two names: the Staunton River, which is also known as the Roanoke River.

Clarksville was recognized in the early 19th century as a tobacco center.  The Clarksville Lake Country Chamber of Commerce notes that by 1832, Clarksville was recognized as one of the fastest growing towns in Virginia.

The Clarksville Tobacco Market was so large and important that The Roanoke Navigation Company was formed to transport the crop by way of the Roanoke River to Petersburg and other areas. They also built a plank road the entire distance from Clarksville to Petersburg – nearly 80 miles as the crow flies – for overland transport. A few years later, the Roanoke Valley Railroad was built from Clarksville to Manson, North Carolina.

The town was incorporated in 1818 and named after its founder, Clark Royster.  While still home to the largest and oldest tobacco market in the world, it is mindful of the future, hosting numerous data centers serving the Federal government.  This diversification keeps the place vibrant and meaningful.  This combined with its proximity to  major population centers and vacation areas such as Virginia Beach, the Appalachian Trail and the Great Smoky Mountains and to major urban centers such as Richmond, Washington DC, and the Triangle area of North Carolina makes Clarksville a convenient vacation getaway.

Clarksville’s character as a vacation getaway with sophisticated residents from major population centers is probably why the annual Lake Country Wine Festival is such a success.  Clarksville is a good jumping off point for visiting another winery on the Southern Virginia Wine Trail, Rosemont of Virginia, which is about 35 miles east of town.

Where to stay?  There are a handful of nondescript motels, but the best place to stay (and dine) is Cooper’s Landing Inn & Traveler’s Tavern in the historic district on Virginia Avenue.  The restaurant is outstanding, and you’ll find our wine on the wine list (of course).

Remember that bullet we thought we dodged a few weeks ago?  We were breathing a sigh of relief we faced a frost event shortly after bud break, but mercifully it did not occur.  Well, that bullet found its mark two weeks ago when we had a two-day freeze around April 10 and 11.  We were on the road, so there was nothing we could have done, anyway; we hear much about helicopter rentals at $1,000 an hour, but I doubt we could find one in Southern Virginia.  Friends living nearby reported the temperature was around 28° Fahrenheit each night, so we knew we were in trouble.

Our return was a bit rushed.   We did not have a chance to see the vineyard when we arrived at Annefield, because we were coming from a meeting with our winemaker, followed by a meeting and site inspection with our winery architect, David Jameson.  Near the house we spied the flush of new growth on Ilex near the house, but had a chilling foreshadow: all the new leaves looked as though a blowtorch had been applied to them.  After our thorough and exhausting meeting with Mr Jameson, we were we able to walk the vines, only to see that our fears were confirmed.  The same weather event affected fruit growers throughout the east and midwest, as reported by Bloomberg, and other news outlets.  The foliage in most of the vineyard appears burned — a sad sight.

Serious, yes, but it isn’t the end of the world.  Frost damage doesn’t kill the vines, it just nips the new growth in the bud.  On a visit last Saturday, our vineyard consultant concluded that we won’t have a crop this year.  A few vines have fruitful clusters, but in the scheme of things it isn’t worth it to try to bring them in.  We’ll make a definitive determination once the secondary buds emerge; they may have fruit, but likely they won’t.  Hybrids have fruitful secondary buds, but even then you might get 50 percent of the fruit the primary bud would have produced.  With Vitis vinifera, don’t expect much.  We may make a go of it and harvest what survived, and add that to purchased fruit.  At least we’re spared the expense of fungicides intended to combat botrytis and other pathogens that target the fruit.

For the companion post, see this link.

What did we learn?  Our sense was that geography is destiny — physically cut off from the rest of Europe by Spain, which was always viewed with suspicion, its greatest ally was and is England, another seafaring power from earlier days.  Of course its royalty formed alliances with the leading houses throughout Europe in that incestuous way of theirs, but for the most part they remained isolated and distinct, even after pushing off into Africa, Asia and the New World and becoming a mercantile superpower (rivaled only by Spain) during the 15^th and 16^th centuries.

Roman Roots: Conimbriga

A fascinating window into the development of the country lies in Conimbriga, a fascinating ancient Roman town outside of the village of Condeixa a-Velha.  It was one of the largest Roman settlements in Portugal, and only 15 percent of the site has been excavated.  What has been uncovered so far gives a glimpse into Roman civilization from the founding of the city in the second millennium B.C. to about 468 A.D., when barbarian invaders finally destroyed the city.

Conimbriga reached its maximum extent in the first century A.D., but by the end of the third century, the Roman Empire had degraded to the point where the city contracted by half its size and built substantial walls to provide protection to the occupants.  The buildings outside of the perimeter of the old wall were razed and their stone used to build the new wall, which was over six meters high and three meters thick, with a permanent garrison.

The one of the more interesting structures is called the House of the Fountains, which was discovered in 1939.  In the middle of the peristyle there is a gardened water arrangement, with raised beds in the middle of a pool.  The various rooms surrounding the peristyle feature impressive, exuberant mosaics, which are well preserved.  These mosaics date from the Severan era, from 193 to 235, and depict several themes, such as hunting, the cycle of Bacchus, Perseus and the Gorgon, and the Chimera.  The name of a single owner of the house has come down to us, C.G. Rufus.

Other sites excavated include lavish baths (several of them, actually), the forum, an aqueduct, various insula (multi-dwelling buildings with plumbing), a Paleo-Christian Basilica, additional grand houses, the largest being attributed to a gentleman called Cantaber, who is known to have been an imperial aristocrat living in Conimbriga when the town was plundered by the Suebii in 468.  This house is known to be the only large house still in use when the town was destroyed that year.

Born of Destruction: Lisbon

On All Saint’s Day, 1 November 1755, a massive earthquake struck in the morning and reduced most of Lisbon to rubble, followed by a great conflagration, then huge waves rolled in an hour later from the Tagus, flooding the lower part of the city.  The death toll has been estimated at 10,000 in Lisbon and up to 100,000 throughout the region, with 85 percent of the Lisbon’s buildings destroyed.  Then — as now — the event was followed by debate over whether the earthquake was a natural phenomenon or an act of divine wrath (recall the reaction of religious pundits to the Haitian Earthquake of 2010).

The great thinkers and literary figures of the time debated the significance of the event, and out of it came several significant works, among them Voltaire’s Candide (1759).  We’re sure you know the story: Candide, born in a  palace, lives a sheltered life in a paradise and follows the “Leibnizian optimism” of his mentor, Pangloss.  Through a series of misadventures, Candide suffers all the hardships of the world, including the great Lisbon earthquake.  In the end Voltaire concludes with Candide advocating the simple phrase, grounded in the practical, and in the earth: “we must cultivate our garden,” in lieu of the Leibnizian mantra of Pangloss, “all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds.

Lisbon’s reconstruction was handled by Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo (1699-1782), the chief minister to José I who later became the Marquês de Pombal.  The reconstruction of the center of Lisbon took place rapidly, with a modern grid plan running from the waterfront.  That area is now known as the Baixa.  It took many years to complete, and the triumphal arch spanning Rua Augusta was not finished until 1873.

Our first night in Lisbon we dined in Baixa at Gambrinus, a tradition-bound restaurant which has been at the same location since 1936.  Our host selected it because of its comprehensive selection of old port.

I won’t recount our meal, but when it came time for dessert and drinks, our host was rather circumspect — was there a surprise in store?  She selected a 1983 Borgos Vintage Port.  Given the age, it turned into quite the production, because there was no way to extract the cork.  The wine had been brought out and laid on its side for a time in a wicker basket.  They dusted off a special table equipped with a flame, and heated up special tongs, which they used to heat the top of the bottle.  After much sweating and pacing (the waiters looked more like prize fighters preparing for a match — a great show), they applied the tongs several times, twisting them to and fro, heating the neck of the bottle, then poured ice water over the neck.  With a gentle tap, the top was off.  They served it.  And it was good.  Quite unlike any of the other ports we’ve had so far; surely the alcohol was as high as the others (around 18 percent), but this was balanced, toasty and nutty, more like cognac than port.  Delightful.

The Duoro and Port Wine

Pombal’s command of the reconstruction led to his almost total political control, and it was during his control of the country that he demarcated the boundaries of the Douro wine region in 1756, the first such mapping in the world.  Out of respect for Pombal we sought out his final resting place in a church in Lisbon, the Igreja da Memória.  He had died a year after being banished from Lisbon by Maria I, the Monarch who succeeded José I.

Traveling from Porto to the Douro wasn’t easy in the old days, and not that simple today, either.  Travel up the river was simplified in the last 50 years with the construction of a series of dams that tamed the wild river.  There is an apocryphal story about Joseph James Forrester, one of the 19^th century Port barons, who lost his life after a lunch at Quinta da Vargellas when his barco rabelo overturned in 1862.  His body was never found, having been weighed down by a money belt filled with funds to pay his farmers, while the ladies in his company were bouyed up by their crinolines.

The Douro is inextricably linked with the cities of Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia, where the port lodges traditionally do their blending.  The two cities gave their name to the country, originally called Portus and Cale; by medieval times the name was given to the region, and finally to the entire kingdom as Portucalia.  On our arrival we checked into the Castelo de Santa Catarina, after a stroll through Porto’s Ribeira district, the Cathedral District, with a stop at the São Bento Railway Station, then down to the waterfront, we tucked in for dinner at a very simple, inexpensive and authentic Portuguese restaurant, called simply “A Grade,” a traditional tasca, with just four or five tables on Rua de São Nicolau.  Definitely a family affair — all of the servers had identical noses.  The owner served us the distilled spirit used to fortify port — We ordered far too much, but enjoyed it immensely.  The next day took us to Vila Nova de Gaia, where we visited a couple of port lodges, starting with Ramos Pinto.  The atmosphere was hushed and reverential; a bit over the top.  We stopped in at Sandeman, but chose not to stay because it was so busy, and visited Quevedo, a relatively new port lodge founded in 1991, which seemed to attract a much younger crowd.

Sitting a cafe on the Porto riverfront you can see virtually all of the port lodges — Cálém, Croft, Sandeman, Ramos Pinto, Ferreira, Graham, Barros, Cockburn, Taylor — their names picked out in lights on each building.  On a hilltop overlooking the entire scene is the Mosteiro da Serra do Pilar, a 16^th century church where Arthur Wellesley (1769-1852) the future Duke of Wellington planned his surprise attack on French forces in 1809, an additional reminder of the close relationship between Portugal and the English that was formalized with the Methuen Treaty of 1703.  That treaty granted favorable trading status to port wine exported to England and English woolen goods imported to Portugal.  During the War of Spanish Succession the English had difficulty securing claret from France, and this alliance with Portugal secured an alternate source of wine for England and helped create the port wine style.  The addition of brandy better preserved port during its journey overseas.

The next morning we traveled first by boat from Porto to the town of Régua, then by train to Pinhão, and then by taxi up long, treacherous roads to where we were staying, the Casa de Casal de Loivos, a 17^th century manor house on a hill top about seven kilometers above Pinhão, which may have the best views in Portugal.  Our rooms were in the portion of the house that once housed the stables.  The house has been in the same family for some 300 years.  They have two and a half acres of vines, a jumble of Tinta Roriz, Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinta Barroca and Tinto Cão.  The Portuguese only recently started planting single varieties in large blocks like we do in other parts of the world. We were informed that some vineyards have up to 35 different varieties mixed together.   The Casa produces its own label, Casa de Casal de Loivos.

The terracing is astounding, and the region has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site (frankly, all of Portugal appears to be one).  Typically each terrace is wide enough for three rows of vines.  The “soil” (if you can call it that) is schist, very rocky and fractured, which allows the vines’ roots to burrow deep into the earth, a necessity in this arid climate.  The rock radiates heat, aiding ripening.  At Casal de Loivos, the vine spacing was about one meter, the space between rows on each terrace about two meters, and the vines trained to a a wire about 5o centimeters from the earth.  This has been going on here for some 2,000 years.

We dined at the Casa that night and had two wines with dinner — preceded by an aperitif of White Port, of course.  The first was a 2009 Morgadio da Calcada, fragrant with hints of lemon and spice, and the second a very complex red blend from the 2009 vintage with wonderful acid, firm tannins and a marvelous bouquet, with hints of leather and lavender from the Quinta do Vallado, a very storied estate owned by the Ferreira family, which has been producing wine since 1751.  It’s most famous owner was the legendary Dona Antònia Adelaide Ferrerira (1810-1896), With her husband she founded the Qunita do Vesúvio estate, and spent 13 years overseeing the terracing and planting.  She was widowed at 33 and continued the business and set about buying and developing vineyards throughout the Duoro, ultimately owning more than 30 quintas.  Nicknamed affectionately A Ferreirinha (“the little Ferreira girl”), she did much to improve the conditions for the Duoro farmers by building hospitals, nurseries, schools and roads.  She was with the unfortunate Mr Forrester when his life was claimed by the Douro in 1862; she survived and lived to the ripe age of 86.

Maria I & the Palácio de Queluz

When we returned to the capital, we did not stay in Lisbon, but at the Pousada de Queluz, about halfway between Lisbon and Sintra.  which was the building that formerly housed the Royal Guard of the Court of the Palace of Queluz.

A note on the Pousada system: In the 1940s the Portuguese government created a national network of state-run country inns.  Usually they are set in remote, scenic locations with friendly, personalized service, and all are in historic or palatial buildings.  Most have highly recommended restaurants.  The restaurant at this Pousada where we dined our second night there, Cozinha Velha, is to be recommended, and often hosts visiting heads of state, who usually stay at the Palacio de Queluz as guests of the Portuguese government.

The Palácio de Queluz was commissioned by Pedro, the younger son of João V, who in 1747 directed that a 17^th century hunting lodge be converted to a summer palace.  After Pedro’s marriage to his niece Maria I (1734-1816) in 1760, the palace was extended and the gardens, Throne Room, Music Room were added. (Maria was the Monarch, and Pedro the Prince Regent.)  This Palace is often compared to Versailles, with good reason, especially for the gardens.

The afternoon of Easter Sunday we stopped at the Jardim de Estrela with its 1884 bandstand, ducks, herbaceous borders, mature trees — a pleasant, shady respite. Overlooking the park is the Basilica da Estrela, which is the burial place of Maria I, who promised to build a church should she bear a son and heir to the throne.  She did, and work began in 1779, but her son eldest son José died from smallpox in 1788 at the age of 27, two years before the Basilica was finished in 1790, and Maria spiraled into depression and suffered terrible visions and hallucinations.  She was, in a word, mad.

When Spanish forces allied with Napoleon invaded Portugal in 1809, the entire royal family fled to Brazil, and Maria died in Rio de Janiero in 1816, but her remains brought back to Lisbon and interred in this church.  The Basilica is in a Baroque neoclassical style, with colored marbles and amazing light.

Dinner that night took us back to Baixa, where we picked another hole in the wall; we did not note the name and probably couldn’t find it again.  We dined on grilled salmon, and a Portuguese specialty of pork and clams, so that night we tried another white from the Duoro, a 2010 Planalto Reserva Vinho Branco Seco, a light-bodied, smooth white with ripe pear, lemon and herbs.  Great acid and balance, perfect with simply prepared fish.  Our second wine (so we could try as much as we can, we have two wines with dinner) was the 2007 Bairrada Marques de Marialva Vinho Tinto, an intense but finely structured wine.  This should have gone with a steak, but it was great with our chocolate dessert.

Other Places.

There were many other stops on the journey: Óbidos, a Medieval walled town; three days in Sintra, with more amazing palaces like the spectacular Palácio de Pena, built on the highest peak in Sintra by Ferdinand Saxe-Coburg-Gotha for his wife Queen Maria II.  It stands on the ruins of a Hieronymite monastery.  The architect was German Baron Von Eschwege, and the place had that heavy, opulent, German Baroque style, certainly not to our taste, but in that magnificent setting something to behold.  The Palácio Nacional de Sintra, with its unusual conical chimneys.  On the tour we learned that the kitchens are in the chimneys, which ventilate the entire kitchen, where whole spits of meat would be turned over fires in the middle of the room.  Quinta da Regaleira, the summer residence of the family of António Augusto de Carvalho Monteiro (1848-1920), with its strange house and even stranger, mystcal gardens.  The Palace of Monserrate is another Romantic monument, perched dreamlike in the Serra Hills of Sintra.  This eclectic palace blends the Venetian Gothic idiom with Indian and Moorish style.  It’s hard to believe the family used the place only a few weeks each year.

Dominating one of the highest peaks in Sintra is the remains of an 8^th century Moorish castle.  While in Sintra we stayed in another landmark, Lawrence’s Hotel, the oldest operating hotel on the Iberian Peninsula, which has been coddling guests since 1764.  Lord Byron (1788-1824) reportedly stayed there in 1809 while writing his epic poem, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage; in that work he described Sintra as a “glorious Eden.”  Yet in the midst of all that splendor is the Capuchos Convent, a 16^th  century Franciscan monastery hewn from the rock of the Sintra HIlls and lined with cork, all quiet and humility and toil.

What Did We Learn?

We visited so many varied around Lisbon and up and down the coast — towns, chapels, museums, monasteries — perhaps we’ll write more on all this later.  Portugal appreciates its rich history, and shows a devotion to its wines and an uncanny sense of place.  We stopped in a few wine shops, and had wine with every lunch and dinner (and on one occasion a sparkler with breakfast, in Luso at the Palace Hotel Bussaco).  Without question the regional specialties and the wine were made for each other, and each spoke volumes about each region.  On only one occasion did we find a restaurant that served a wine other than Portuguese, and that was an Italian restaurant on the Tagus in the shadow of the Monument to the Discoveries called Nosolo Italia, which had a few bottles of Italian wine (one of our guidebooks wrote highly of it, and we had enough codfish).  Just to have something different we ordered the “house wine,” which turned out to be a rather lifeless Italian Chardonnay — but even at this restaurant, the wine list was dominated by Portuguese selections.  The wine shops?  Same story — all of the offerings in the few we visited were Portuguese.

Is there a lesson here?  Just to bring it home — the locavore/locapour movement has certainly embraced this devotion to place and terroir; the Portuguese already live it.   Surely those who embrace other cultures when on that soil, live it.  We try to, immersing ourselves in the place we are visiting.  How better to know it?  But why is there that disconnect in the United States?  We recall news stories reporting that many chefs in San Francisco, for example, choose to pair their food with French and Italian wines because they don’t believe the local wine complements their cuisine, to the horror of the locavore and the winemaker.  Here’s what we’d like to see: a “foodie” destination where most restaurants feature food and wine without qualification or reference to the cuisine of other countries and cultures  – more Inn at Little Washington or The Clifton Inn or Patowmack Farm or Molasses Grill than Tavola Italian Kitchen or Tra Vigne or Bistro Jeanty.  To fully enjoy and appreciate a place, we want an authentic experience that is an expression of that place, and not a pastiche of somewhere else.  We’re getting there — but will this take 2,000 years on these shores?  Let’s hope not.

For additional photographs, see this link.

A couple of weeks ago we happened across this spectacular corkscrew machine built by an artist called Rob Higgs.  and a Youtube video showing it in action.  It’s a thing to behold, with some 250 parts, cast in bronze.  I’d hate to be charged with polishing it.

Surely this thing would give Rube Goldberg a run for the money.   There must have been a fashion early in the 20th century for artists drawing fantastic complicated mechanisms that perform simple tasks  – the United Kingdom had a contemporary of Goldberg called Heath Robinson.  Production of this device is limited to 25 units.  The first three sold to exclusive hotels for £100,000, and the remaining units are available and priced at £75,000 each, which is about $119,000 US.

This had us thinking about wine closures — specifically, screw tops.   When we started on this adventure in Virginia wine, the growers and wineries we talked to were a bit adamant about using cork, because they felt it helped give legitimacy to an industry perceived by outsiders as not the same quality as the usual suspects.  This was over six years ago, and public sentiment appears to have caught up with the technology.  For example, Richard Woodward reported in Decanter Magazine last November 2011 that acceptance of screwcaps had more than doubled for UK consumers since the last survey in 2003.  The survey was conducted by research company Wine Intelligence for its 2011 Closures Report, and the results showed that 85 percent of the regular wine-drinking population now accepts screwcaps – compared to only 41% in 2003.

Wine consumers in the United States, on the other hand, have been slower to embrace alternative closures.   A survey by Tragon, Corp. published in December 2011  found that natural cork remains the overwhelming choice for U.S. wine drinkers, because it conveys higher quality than alternative closures.

According to the survey, 94 percent of respondents said they would be more likely to purchase wine with natural cork.  A nearly equal number, 93 percent, said that natural cork conveys high or very high quality.

“These results are remarkable because we rarely find such overwhelming agreement among consumers,” said Rebecca Bleibaum, Tragon’s Vice President, Sensory and Consumer Insights.  “We consider 70 percent to be a powerful plurality, but 94 percent positive purchase interest is almost unheard of.”

Other key findings included:

• Only 45 percent of respondents said they would consider purchasing wine with a screw-cap.  Seventy-two percent said they would consider wines with a synthetic closure.
• For gifts, dinner parties and special occasions, as many as 90 percent of respondents said they would prefer wines sealed with cork.  Sixty percent of respondents said wines with synthetic closures were inappropriate for gifts, and 78 percent indicated they would not consider giving screw-capped wines as gifts.
• Compared to similar Tragon studies conducted in 2004 and 2007, consumer opinion changed the most for screw-caps, with the closures having reached their peak of popularity in 2007. Compared to four years ago, the closure is now seen as less appropriate for all occasions.
• Half of respondents thought that wines with a screw-cap were of low quality.  Only 11 percent indicated that screw-caps conveyed high quality.

What is it about the U.S. wine drinker’s resistance to progress?  It’s like or refusal to embrace a dollar coin, though intellectually we know that its the right thing to do.  We had a discussion about it with one wine merchant about it, who said “If the wine isn’t going to be aged more than 10 years, there’s no reason not to use screw caps.”

We will admit the absence of ceremony when opening a screwcap enclosure is a bit of a letdown.  There must be some way to inject a little romance into the act.  I recall a server in one restaurant who wrapped a towel over the end as if opening a Champagne bottle; that small gesture elevated the experience a tiny bit, though one  might argue that concealing the deed is somehow dishonest.

International Screwcap Initiative

Some years ago Australian and New Zealand winemakers took the lead and launched the International Screwcap Initiative to promote the closure.  The rationale and evidence are compelling, backed by decades of research.   Wine geeks know all the arguments, but to summarize, here are the most compelling reasons:

• There is no possibility of cork taint – from corks contaminated by the organic pesticide
• The wine suffers no sporadic oxydation – from oxygen entering through irregular or defective corks
• No flavor modification from exposure to cork - no flavors are imparted by the corks, since the screwcap material is completely neutral
• Screwcaps provide a reliable long-term seal - the industry is working hard to change the association of screwcaps with wines that must be drunk young.
• Screwcaps simplify cellaring and storage – there is no need to store bottles on their sides, and no concern about maintaining humidity.
• Screwcaps are environmentally friendly - screwcaps are constructed of aluminum and can be recycled.
• Wine can age under screwcaps – This, to us, is the most controversial and most compelling.  The ISI Initiative website offers this summary:

Following the AWRI/ACI closures trial in the 1970s, Dr Bryce Rankine stated that, “… the range of wines examined retained their quality with a stelvin closure significantly better than with a cork.”  Subsequent trials have proven that screwcaps retain fruit, diminish the incidence of oxidised characteristics and bottle variation better than any other closure currently available on the market.

Before deciding to bottle their Chablis Grand Crus under screwcaps, Michel Laroche undertook similar comparative experiments, using 11 different types of closure over a 5 year period. His findings confirm the AWRI results and the percentage of his wines sealed under screwcap has significantly increased since he introduced them with the 2002 vintage.

Among some of the oldest red wines under screwcaps is a 1966 Mercurey which, when tasted 38 years later, showed remarkable freshness and structure and samples from Australian wineries confirm these results.

Perhaps one of the greatest areas of debate is the importance of oxygen in winemaking and bottle ageing. Revered oenologists, such as Ribereau-Gayon and Peynaud, have long claimed that oxygen ingress is not a condition for wine ageing in the bottle, or for the development of bottle bouquet.

“Reactions that take place in bottled wine do not require oxygen.” Jean Ribereau-Gayon.

“… it is the opposite of oxidation, a process of reduction or asphyxia, by which wine develops in the bottle.” Emile Peynaud

The reactions that produce what we know as bottle bouquet are reductive, and occur at low redox potentials in the relative absence of oxygen. The rate of oxygen ingress through a screwcap with a tin liner is very small, and appears to be comparable to that of a very good natural cork or technical cork. It is also very consistent, thereby minimising bottle variation.

Have Virginia wineries embraced it?  We know of only one that uses screwcaps exclusively, and that’s Blenheim Vineyards in Charlottesville.  We haven’t done a scientific survey (or for that matter an unscientific one), but we have decided to give them a try with our 2011 white wines, but will likely continue to use natural cork for the reds.  If we didn’t, how could we use that fabulous corkscrew?  See it in action here.

Update, 13 April 2012: We’ve been informed by numerous readers that Tarara Winery in Loudoun County, Virginia is also exclusively screwcap.  Thanks to all for that information.

The War.  The War has many names — did you know that it isn’t over yet?  Northerners call it the Civil War, although those mindful of the English Civil War will call it the American Civil War; papers published shortly after the conflict called it the War of the Rebellion, while many Southerners call it the War Between the States, supporting the outlook that the states were and are independent entities and that status should be respected.  Some sound downright foolish, like “The War of Northern (or Southern) Aggression,” and some wags have referred to it as “the, er, late unpleasantness,” but that designation trivializes the sacrifice of the thousands who lost their lives during that conflict.

We were reminded of it during the Virginia Wine Expo, of all things.  While driving to the Richmond Convention Center on the morning of February 25 we spied what appeared to be the mustering of Confederate troops, which turned out to be an annual rally by the Sons of Confederate Veterans to commemorate of the establishment of the Confederate government in Richmond and the inauguration of Jefferson Davis as its president.   William Faulkner’s observation is especially prescient at times like this in the South — “The past is never dead.  It’s not even past.”

At Annefield we commemorate “The War” with what we call our Civil War Hall.  The upstairs hall is furnished as a sitting room and is lined with images commemorating the early republic and that conflict.  Among them is this engraving of Robert E. Lee on horseback with General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox, The Surrender of General Lee depicting the meeting of Lee and Grant on 9 April 1865.  The reflection in the glass on the left is of the doors opening the porch over the front entrance.   The photograph’s composition is a bit weird, but it was an attempt to include the view looking north toward Appomattox.  Other works on display include a print depicting President Abraham Lincoln with his wartime cabinet (found in horrific condition in Gordonsville, but restored by our favorite paper conservator, Rachel Ray Cleveland of Cleveland Conservation of Art on Paper), called Abraham Lincoln and His Cabinet Discuss the Emancipation Proclamation, an engraving from an 1864 painting by Francis Bicknell Carpenter; this work is particularly interesting because it is a composite; supposedly all the men pictured detested one another and would not sit in the same room (his “team of rivals”), so each was drawn individually then placed in the composition.  We know of examples of it in the Library of Congress, the National Portrait Gallery and the Filson Historical Society Library in Louisville, Kentucky.

We also have a map showing action during the War in Southside Virginia, showing troop movements close to the house.   The detail below shows troops moving along Horsepen Creek, which is at the bottom of the field north of the house. Our collection includes contemporary images of General Sherman, General Lee, a collection of portraits of Confederate Generals, and there are a pair of Romantic prints by Nathaniel Currier (one undated, the other dated 1840) showing a soldier who appears to be dressed for the War of 1812  leaving, then returning to his beloved (The Soldier’s Adieu and The Soldier’s Return).  We have two lithographs depicting Andrew Jackson and Daniel Webster from a series by Edmund Burke Kellogg and Elijah Chapman Kellogg, Portrait Gallery of Distinguished American Citizens (1845) printed on linen with some of the background enhanced with subtle embroidery.  Slightly kitchy, but charming.

Map Detail Showing Annefield in the path of Union Troop movements.

Which brings us to a favorite story: Richard Bennett Goode (1845-1913), the son of the builder of the house at Annefield, Hillery M.L. Goode (1815-1900) , helps put all this in context. A brief summary of the life of Richard Bennett Goode, Hillery’s second son, helps explain Mr Goode’s life, times and travels. According to an entry in the Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography (Lyon G. Tyler, ed., Vol. IV, NY: Lewis Historical Publishing Co., 1915), Richard Bennett Goode’s education at Thomas T. Bouldin’s Classical School in Charlotte Court House was interrupted by the War. He was seventeen years of age when he joined the Confederate Army and enlisted in the First Richmond Howitzers, serving throughout the entire War. Among the battles he participated in were the first and second Manassas, Gettysburg, and Orange Court House. He was with General Robert E. Lee for the surrender at Appomattox Court House where he received his parole, then returned to Charlotte Court House to complete his education. After completing his courses, Mr Goode taught school in Kentucky and Tennessee for a number of years, returned to Charlotte County where he joined the mercantile business of C. W. Thorne & Company of Richmond, then removed to Lynchburg in the early 1880s where he was elected High Constable, serving for many years until his death in 1913 (the Lynchburg News reports that the elder Goode sometimes acted as his son’s Deputy).  A photograph of Richard Bennett Goode hangs in the Reading Room of the Jones Memorial Library in Lynchburg among photographs of other leaders of the Garland Road Camp United Confederate Veterans.

Consider, for a moment, the Surrender: Richard Bennett Goode would no doubt have laid down his arms and been allowed to go home from Appomattox, some 52 miles distant.  If he were lucky, there would have been travel by horse or wagon, but he most likely walked from Appomattox Court House down present day Route 47 to his parent’s home, greeted by them in the hall and parlor that we now use as our tasting room — a humbling thought.  This brings home and brings to life the events of almost 150 years ago, bitter memories that still live in the minds of those re-enactors we saw in Richmond that day.