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I’m writing this while returning from three days of
intensive tasting in Bierzo, which is also to say that I’m winding up a
seven-day trip. No kidding. Bierzo is so remote that it is taking me
longer to get there and back than the span I could enjoy tasting in the
region, and that’s timed from the East Coast of the USA to Bierzo, which is on the western side of Spain, which is among the most westerly of all European countries.
To say that Bierzo is a remote wine region is indisputably true but also
trivial, because Bierzo’s wines are so superb that they make the
journey worth the effort—regardless of the rigors involved. This was my
third visit to  Bierzo,
and if I were invited back next week, after I’d finished my laundry and
caught a bit of sleep, I’d turn around and go back.
The best reds made in Bierzo from the Mencía grape variety can measure
up to any reds made from anything, anywhere. Moreover, in the years
since I first visited Bierzo in 2007, the best whites made from the
Godello grape variety have risen from mere curiosities, even within the
region, to contenders for the title of Spain’s best white table wines.
I could certainly understand if you dismissed such high praise as overly
excited verbiage from someone freshly returned from an enjoyable trip.
However, the fact is that I’m writing this in a cramped Economy seat on
an airplane during the fourth of four transit days—a sufficiently
inglorious situation to encourage sober assessment even if my portion of
the plane wasn’t occupied by a passenger with a truly astonishing case
of flatulence.
Bierzo wines are every bit as good as I’ve claimed here, and though you
may not have direct experience to corroborate my glowing account, you’ll
find that tasting is believing once you get your chance. That may
require some time and effort if you don’t live in a major metropolitan
area, as the wines aren’t plentiful and aren’t yet  widely
distributed in the USA. Yet the expansion of direct shipping has made
direct tasting experience vastly easier than it was not long ago, and
I’ll follow up this blog posting with so many tasting notes on Wine Review Online that almost everyone reading these lines will have a fighting chance with a bit of effort.
“Effort” is an appropriate word for emphasis in relation to Bierzo,
where the best vineyard plots are often small, isolated, and so steeply
inclined that simply stepping into the loose slate soil is a
life-risking proposition. Just as there’s nothing easy about getting to
Bierzo, there’s nothing easy about viticulture within the region, and
likewise nothing easy about getting the wines out to world markets to
gain the attention they deserve.
To underline that point, I’d like to paraphrase a reflection offered by a
vintner over dinner a couple of nights ago. I won’t attribute what
follows to the speaker by name, as I’m working from memory and a hastily
scribbled note, and also because I can’t check the quote from my
present location at 35,000 feet of altitude. Moreover, there’s a chance
that others in Bierzo might not take kindly to a resident’s musing to a
 journalist
about the region’s supremely challenging remoteness at a time when
Bierzo is enjoying its first little taste of limelight.
My dinner companion made a striking statement, and it came “out of the
blue,” as none of us at the table were talking about the Camino de
Santiago. For centuries, this “Way of St. James” has been the most
famous route for pilgrims in Christendom, bringing a steady stream of
hardy and presumably pious hikers across northern Spain to Santiago de
Compostela, where the remains of the Saint are purportedly interred all
the way on the Atlantic coast. A “steady stream” is hardly a throng,
and pious pilgrims aren’t likely to trumpet the virtues of wines they
enjoyed as the most meaningful aspect of a hike that is much more about
pain than pleasure. But those facts make the statement all the more
striking, so I’ll close with it, paraphrasing as best I can:
“If it were not for the Camino passing through Bierzo, we’d have
nothing, and really be nowhere. Surrounded by mountains, there’s only
one way in and one way out, basically along the river Sil. Back when
the Romans ruled the region, they only made wine here because it was too
difficult to transport wine in from areas where they could make it more
easily. When the Moors controlled Iberia, they concluded that Bierzo
wasn’t worth the trouble, and simply abandoned it. When the monastic
orders arrived, reviving viticulture and winemaking in Bierzo, they came
here only because they were safe in the area, and that was only because
nobody would bother to attack them here. Seriously, if not for the
Camino, nobody would even know this place exists.”
Everything I know about the history of Bierzo—and Spain more broadly—suggests that my tablemate had this  exactly
right. Looking ahead, though, I’d offer an observation that runs
slightly to the contrary. The day is fast approaching when Bierzo will
be known by hundreds of thousands of people who know nothing about the
Camino, and who are aware only the distinctiveness and deliciousness of
the region’s wines. And once that day has arrived, curious wine
pilgrims will likely outnumber their religious counterparts, however
difficult the journey.
By the way, the journey isn’t all that bad,
though planes and trains are useless. Just rent a car at the Madrid
airport and make the four-hour drive, stopping for an espresso every
hour or so you don't fall asleep and run off the road after flying all
night (as I nearly did about five times).
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