On Football, Beaches and Winery Tourism

You may not have known it but, last Sunday, 29th June, was “Winery Open House Day “, when all wineries throughout Portugal were supposed to open their doors to curious and thirsty city dwellers. We sceptically agreed to go along with it. Our scepticism was due to the fact that the meteorological dept. was promising the mercury to top 40º, and most sane people on such a day, would rather head to a lovely Atlantic beach, than drive to the sweltering Alentejo to drink hearty red wine. Looks like most people, understandably enough, choose the beach option. Another unlucky coincidence with the timing was the fact that the date also coincided with the final match of the European Football Cup , which most Portuguese wanted to tune into, in solidarity with their Spanish neighbors.

Of course in the Barossa , or Napa Valleys , winery tourism is big business. In Portugal the idea is still in it’s infancy, with some notable and exemplary exceptions (Esporão and Maladinha Nova to name a couple closeby).

At Cortes de Cima, we started many years ago via our Winery Club, to organize events to encourage winelovers to visit us. Our Annual Summer Vineyard Concert is the best example of what we do to bring winedrinkers to the vineyards, and last month’s 6th annual concert, was as always, a great success.

If you missed that, but don’t want to wait until next year’s Summer Concert, mark Saturday December 6th onto your calendar already now! That is the date scheduled for our annual Danish Christmas Lunch , a sort of belated ‘Sao Martinho ‘ party, where we match all our latest wines with our Danish Chef’s Bjarne Otto’s scrumptious Danish specialities.

See you soon.