Wed. Sept. 22, 2010 Uco Vally wine tour

On Wed. we had an especially wonderful day. It was a private tour of Uco Valley south of Mendoza. We went to 3 wineries. The first stop was Pulenta Estates. We started off with a glass of pinot grigio or savagnoin blanc and then went for a walk in the vineyard and a tour of the winery. We then had a tasting (more like a glass each) of a cab sav, malbec, and cab franc at a special table in the barrel room, beautiful. During this portion another group of 4 joined us. At this point, Zach was sleeping in the car and the driver was keeping an eye out in case he woke up- his first long nap in a while. We had a really nice time here. We tasted, at each winery, a variety of classes of wine, from their "young" grouping (which means it either had no time in oak or just a short time like 3 months, these wines tend to be more fruity and less oaky or complex, this doesn´t mean not good, I actually usually really liked them) to their more expensive lines.
The next bodega we went to was Benvenuto de la Serna, a very small family run winery. We toured to winery and had a tasting inside the owner´s house in the dining room. Zach enjoyed this because he was able to crawl around and flirt with the ladies as he usually does. This time it was just us, our guide, and the guide from the winey. -We tasted a viognier, sangivese, and a blend of malbec and tempranillo- all very good.

The last stop was O´Fornier. Here we had a 5 course lunch overlooking the vineyards and the mountains. Each course of food was paired with one o their wines. It was delicious and the wine was really good. Zach even had his own special food of mashed potatoes. After lunch we toured the winery and then headed back to our hotel. Zach napped again all the way back.

This evening we ate at a restaurant that again catered to Zach, making mashed pumpkin and potatoes for him, giving us extra space so we could move everything away from him (he now grabs at everything!) After dinner we stopped back at the wine tasting bar to inquire about a wine club... how lucky for us...they have one via an importor in CA (means we don´t have to pay international shipping)... so of course we joined. I couldn´t really enjoy the wines here with out knowing I could continue to enjoy them when we got home!