A tipple in the saddle

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This was published 12 years ago

A tipple in the saddle

Wine route ... vines in the Colchagua Valley.

Wine route ... vines in the Colchagua Valley.Credit: Getty Images

Ben Stubbs cycles between cellar doors in the nation's best wineries, just beyond the city of Santiago.

I love a glass of good red wine. I like to think of myself as a wine enthusiast, though my friends have told me I don't have the sort of palate that can distinguish hints of freshly cut grass or a nose for spicy berries.

Nevertheless, I arrive in Chile to search out "damp earth aromas and dark chocolate finishes" while exploring the wine regions near the capital, Santiago.

Like the spokes on a wheel, the main wine regions of Chile are conveniently located around Santiago and are easy to explore in a day trip or a longer wine tour.

I could hire a car but instead decide to explore the San Antonio Valley by mountain bike with Santiago Adventures, which runs two-day trips departing from the capital.

Only an hour from the centre of the city, the green fields and rolling hills of the San Antonio Valley have me imagining I've stepped into an Umbrian landscape. I pump the tyres and head out along country roads with the founder of Santiago Adventures, Brian Pearson. Seven years ago he left Idaho looking for a sea change and chose Chile.

We're alone as we pedal past vineyards and fields of wildflowers. Though Chilean wine has been steadily gaining awards and fans (including high praise for its sauvignon blancs and pinot noirs), wine tourism is still in its infancy among domestic travellers. Most Chileans prefer beer, even though a good bottle of wine here costs less than $10.

We cycle 10 kilometres through bucolic countryside, from the low hills that mark the beginning of the San Antonio Valley to the vineyards of Matetic, one of Chile's showcase producers. Now it's time to get off our seats for the climb to the cellar door. This winery is cut into the side of a steep hill that helps regulate the temperature during winemaking, and there's a raft of green measures in place, including the use of native vegetation, natural fertiliser and alpacas among the vines to keep the weeds down.

We tour the cellars with Jose Ramon, a winemaker with a nose that would make Gerard Depardieu envious. Past the French oak barrels and the five-tonne fermentation tanks is the tasting room.

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Ramon lets his beak guide him, detecting a field of peaches in the sauvignon blanc, a plate of buttered bread in the chardonnay and a smouldering habana cigar in the flagship syrah EQ, which won a gold medal at the International Wine Challenge in 2008.

I have wine envy; my button nose only picks up the sugars of the sauvignon blanc and the "grapeyness" of the reds. But I close my eyes, nod slowly and say as little as possible.

We hop back on the trail and ride through blueberry fields and down the rocky sierras that lead towards the poplar-lined hamlet at the end of the San Antonio Valley.

At the end of our 30-kilometre cycle is the village of Lo Abarca. On the side of the road near the dusty main square, Pearson turns off at El Sauce, a hole-in-the-wall restaurant that serves the best pork in Chile. The marinated chancho a la Chilena is a slow-roasted pig marinated in a secret mix of home-grown spices and it is worth the effort getting there.

Well-fuelled, we cycle up the hill to Casa Marin, where the Spanish-style bodega has views across to the Pacific Ocean in the distance. Maria Luz Marin, the only female winery owner in Chile, runs Casa Marin. It has won awards for the most outstanding sauvignon blanc and more recently the world's best pinot noir, yet remains a down-to-earth operation. Maria's brother, Osvaldo, leads us through the winery and sits with us like an old friend as we chat and taste. The cellars here have deep cracks running along the ceilings from the February 2010 earthquake, yet the damage was much worse further south in the Colchagua Valley, my next destination.

I travel back to Santiago for the night and leave my bike for the next leg of the journey three hours' drive south of the city.

I travel along the Colchagua Valley, framed by the Andes range and the fruit and vegetable farms by the road. This region is known for its outstanding carmenere and cabernet wines. The ruins of mud-brick bodegas are the only remaining scars from the earthquake, though the damage at the time was spectacular.

"Many of our tanks weren't secured and rivers of wine spilt through Colchagua," says Paula Aguilera, of Santa Cruz winery, the flashiest wine producer in the region.

They call this the Disneyland of the Chilean wine industry and as I approach a gigantic Easter Island statue while sitting in a Swiss-made cable car that flies over the vineyards, I understand why. Carlos Cardoen, a Chilean arms manufacturer and entrepreneur, owns Santa Cruz winery and has created his own Neverland in the Colchagua hills. I tour the winery's museum (the largest private-collection museum in Latin America), visit its resort-style hotel and finally try the carmenere, the signature red wine of Chile.

I follow the lead of my tour guide, Robinson. If you drink the carmenere cold, he says, "it'll behave like a wild horse. If you warm it a little beforehand ... it'll behave like a gentleman." He gurgles and spits his mouthful of gran reserva 2009. I nod and spit into the bucket, too, and offer my view that the carmenere behaves quite nicely.

My final destination is north of Santiago in the shadows of South America's highest peak. Aconcagua, at 6962 metres, towers like a lighthouse above an ocean of vineyards. The Aconcagua Valley is lush with plantations of avocados, peaches and walnuts and I follow the folds of the Aconcagua River with Pearson and his Santiago Adventures van this time to Errazuriz, one of the oldest wineries in Chile, which introduced vines from France in 1870.

Premium bottles cost less that $20 at Errazuriz and after days of swilling, sniffing and spitting I believe I can detect some spicy notes and berry finishes. "It really doesn't matter if you spend $500 on a bottle, or you prefer to drink it out of a box," says Pearson on our drive back to Santiago. "A good wine is what it means to you."

He is right. I'm confident on my return home I can impress the friends who once doubted my tales of damp earth aromas and smoky finishes.

Ben Stubbs travelled courtesy of Santiago Adventures.

FAST FACTS

Getting there

Lan Airlines has a fare to Santiago for about $2225 low-season return from Sydney via Auckland (about 17hr including transit time). Melbourne passengers pay about $100 more and fly to Sydney to connect and back from Auckland. For about the same fare,

Qantas flies non-stop from Sydney to Buenos Aires, connecting with Lan Airlines to Santiago.

Touring there

Santiago Adventures runs customised wine tours through Chile and Argentina. A two-day bike ride through the San Antonio Valley costs $US691 ($650), including accommodation, selected meals, wine tasting, use of mountain bikes and a bilingual guide; santiagoadventures.com.

Staying there

In Santiago: The Aubrey is a boutique hotel in the heart of the capital and makes a great base for exploring the wine country. Double rooms cost from $US240, including breakfast and pool access; theaubrey.com.

In Colchagua: Hotel Santa Cruz is the best-positioned hotel in the valley. Double rooms cost from $US124 and include spa access, breakfast and tours to the winery; hotelsantacruzplaza.cl.

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