Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
grapes that threatens the Old World order.
Further investigations and discreet inqui-
ries at the tourist office in Santiago de
Chile reveal that your quarry is located
80km (49 miles) from the capital. Its name:
Vina Indomita.
Penetrating vineyard security is your
next challenge. You go disguised as a tour-
ist, armed with a digital camera and SPF 30
sunscreen. The winery is a gleaming,
churchlike structure on top of a hill over-
looking hundreds of acres of vineyards.
Huge white arches sweep in front of a mir-
rored-glass facade that leads to a tall round
tower. The fact that you made a telephone
appointment gets you safely past recep-
tion, and suddenly you are in the heart of a
gleaming, hangarlike winery crammed with
tanks and the latest winemaking wizardry.
It is huge, spacious, and well designed. The
network of pipes that feed the stainless-
steel vats is operated by an invincible
energy source—gravity. The impression is
startling—it looks unnervingly like the
showroom for a secret weapon.
You go below, skillfully dodging a busy
platoon of men on forklifts. Built into the
side of the hill, the cellar room is cool and
dark. Tidy rows of barrels line the long cel-
lar floor. You surreptitiously join a tour
group and successfully infiltrate the wine-
tasting rooms. The hostess pours you an
Indomita Sauvignon Blanc, golden and
fragrant. You are speechless.
Dangerous thoughts of defecting enter
your head. You could hide out in the
nearby Pacific resort of Viña del Mar, you
begin to plot resourcefully. To buy time,
you decide to have lunch in the winery
restaurant, an elegant space of curved
windows, designer lamps, and polished
floors. Desperately trying to maintain your
cover, you order some wine from the win-
ery's vineyards in Maipo Valley, a region
just south of Santiago with some of the
oldest vineyards in South America. You sip
the delicious Carménère.
You panic.
You see the future, and it says Indómita.
The French are doomed. You envision
huge lakes of European wine, unwanted
Beaujolais poured down drains. You must
go and report to HQ as soon as possible,
but wait. First let's try that nice bottle of
Cabernet Sauvignon. . . .
Viña Indómita,
Casablanca Valley
(
&
56/32/275-4400;
www.indomita.cl).
(
Santiago de Chile (72km/44 miles).
L
$$$
Hotel Casablanca Valle,
Ruta
68, Tapihue, Casablanca (
&
56/32/274-
2711;
www.hotelrutadelvino.cl). $$
Hotel
Thomas Somerscales,
San Enrique 446,
Cerro Alegre, Valparaíso (
&
56/32/233-
1006;
www.hotelsomerscales.cl).
South America
357
Casa Madero
A Mexican Revolution
Coahuila, Mexico
Think Mexican wine is a new phenomenon?
Think again. Founded in 1597, Casa Madero
is the oldest winery in the Western Hemi-
sphere, an intriguing mix of Spanish colo-
nial splendor and ancient winemaking
heritage.
Walking around the winery grounds, you
realize that there is a lot more to Mexican
beverages than tequila and beer. Take, for
example, the copper still on a narrow brick
pedestal—it looks like a giant magic lan-
tern, except that in this case, the genie in
