Blog special from the winners of the Harpers/ Wines of Argentina competition - Part 4

It's the turn of Jake Crimmin again to update us on all the latest from Argentina. Over the next few days we are running a blog special from the winners of the Harpers/ Wines of Argentina Steak Your Claim competition. Each of our five winners are enjoying a tour of each of the main wine regions and visiting key producers to give them a taste of what Argentina can offer the UK, and sending back missives of their travels. Here's the latest from Jake...

So it's already my turn to blog again. Where do you think we were going to find the time to write? We've barely been left time to sleep!

Although i really can't complain, I can only say the adventure is going way too fast. But what a phenomenal adventure it as been.

So in the interest of leaving sleep for wimps and maximizing our wine time in the day, we boarded the night bus from San Juan on Thursday evening and followed the Andes which lay to our west for a 16 hour treck to Salta. A city and region in the far North of Argentina that crowns Torrontes as it's principal grape. An altitude adoring white that was brought to Argentina by the Jesuits as far back as the 16th Century.

About thirteen hours in and I was rudely awaken by what I thought at the time was turbulence (don't laugh, I was tired and it can get windy in them mountains!). It seems there are turns in the roads in the north. So used, was I, to the constant arrow straights of central/ south Argentina that turning a corner had me waking up in a cold sweat!

Hitting Salta we emerged from the bus dazed, confused , hungry and humming (apart from the ladies of course who, as everone knows, always smell of roses and peaches). A slap up lunch was certainly the order of the day. This was to be accompanied by one, sorry two bottles of the local speciality grape in the form of Don David Torrontes. A wonderfully fragrant, fresh white with a crisp, icy acidity whose aromas of violets and honeydew melon almost quashed the pong of these gratefull travellers.

And so off again for the three hour minibus drive to Cafayate Valley.

And by Jove, what a drive it was. The sun was shining and the scenery was awe-inspiring. This was the part of the journey I had been most excited about. A narrow valley packed with every conceivable geological feature. Craggy rocks, sloping strata, rain rounded stone lined by looming mountains. Roberto, our driver, had obviously sensed the energy in the bus and found fit to accompany the mood with some eighties power ballads. The serenity of the Cafayate Valley carved by millions of years of shifting glacier planes was brought crumbling down by Emilys' and Meeghans' howling into invisible microphones.nChris De Burgh now has even more to answer for.

Arriving, at last, at our hotel Patios De Cafayate and quite simply wow, wow, wow. The hotel was converted from the Michel Torino winery which was set up in 1892 and now goes by El Esteco. It's architecture truely representative of the culture of the colonists in the old, grand spanish Bodega style. Its setting is inspired. In the middle of the old vineyards on the plain lined by mountains to the east and west. Every direction is a picture postcard view. Señor Michel was certainly a bright spark in 1892 to think "I know. I'll make my living making wine here". What an office.

With barely time to check in and explore our beautiful Colonial style rooms, let alone the chi laden spa (Torrontes bath anyone?), our host and Production Manager for El Esteco, Maximilano Lester brings us to the adjacent winery and the lab for a tasting. Here we're inroduced to Alejandro Pepa, the Chief Winemaker that has rose through the ranks over the last eight years. First up is the organic Cuma range.

Incredibly well priced entry level wines with a wonderfully fragrant, unoaked, young drinking Malbec and an unoaked and suprisingly complex Cabernet Savignon that goes further to re-affirm the feeling that this grape is a constant and worthy competitior to the Malbec of this country.

Next in the glass is the Don David range (Michel Torino is added to the label for the export market). Our most esteemed guest from the afternoons lunch makes a welcome return in the form of the Don David Torrontes and the Malbec and Cabernet Savignon give us an indication to the shifting style this region has to offer. The vineyards embedded in this mountainous valley range from 1700 to 3000 metres above sea level and are home to the highest vineyards in the world. The intensity of the 300 days of sunlight this gives the fruit translates with clarity to the wines. Tannins are firmer, colours are quite literally ultra-violet and fruit comes with power and luminosity.

Dinner was in our sumptous hotel with Maximilano and my very first Llama steak. At last. Revenge for the one that bit my finger and spat in my ten year old face at the zoo. A dish best served medium rare.

If it wasn't for Maximilano being such a genuinely nice chap and a perfect host it would've been quite easy to loathe the man. Firstly, what a cool name! But It wasn't enough that he sounded like a gladiator and his perfect job was set in the most beautiful place I've ever seen (Not an exaggeration). It emerges that he lives a 200 metre walk from the winery. Well that's just plain rude.

Oh, and I fell in love with an inaminate object for the first time last night. My bed.

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