Spain, Day Thirty-Two

Today was another adventure day for us. We scheduled a tour through a few wineries that are in the suburbs of Madrid! This was my first time going through any sort of winery before so I was very excited about this new experience. We'll go ahead and get the palabra del dia out of the way early this post because I know you all know it's coming. So we all know the word for wine in Spanish is "vino," but did you know the word for winery is "bodega?" Also, if you know the word for red, which is "rojo," you might assume that red wine is "vino rojo" but its actually "vino tinto," which I think just translates to "tinted wine." So there's a little vocabulary lesson in Spanish for you.

I'm going to be frank, I did not actually learn a whole lot about the process of wine actually being made. They tried to explain it to us, but between their thick Spanish accents and the growing buzz from all the wine I was tasting, I decided just to see it as an opportunity to taste different wines and see which ones I liked. Truthfully, I liked just about all of them, which is shocking considering when I was younger and my parents would let me taste their wine, I would tell them that it tasted like "every other red wine I had ever tasted," which means it was gross. It's funny how your palate can change over time. I never thought I would be a wine person, but now I kind of like it (especially in Sangria!).

So we toured three different wineries, and all before lunch so you know we were feeling pretty good that afternoon. I'm not much of a day drinker, but sipping various wines and eating meat and cheese appetizers that they prepared for us was actually pretty nice. So since I don't have much to say about the wine-making process, I'm going to split my pictures up between all of the different bodegas and just show you what I saw all day.


Bodega #1:  El Regajal

A couple of the wines we tasted. Wine is pretty cheap in Europe!

Dad and me standing in the vineyard

The wine casks. The guy showing us around actually siphoned it straight out of the cask to let us try some.

Bodega #2:  Peral

Just casually chatting with the owner. He only spoke Spanish.

The wine here was super cheap because they have these caves that keep the wine at the perfect temperature, so there is no need to have electricity and pay an unnecessary bill.

Bodega #3:  Consuelo

A couple of the wines we tasted.

The owner of the place showing us the different tools her family used to use to gather and press grapes about 100 years ago.

Our tour guide divvying up the goods. We also had some really good olive oil at this place.

After a long afternoon of taste-testing and making new friends, we crashed pretty hard back at our apartment. I actually was feeling a little too sugared-up from all of the wine so I decided to stay in and relax while my parents went out to dinner across the street. They informed me that they were missing their translator a bit while they were out and had to just point to what they wanted on the menu and smile and nod. It's good to know that I'm finally contributing to this family in some way, haha. Needless to say, I went to sleep pretty early that night and slept in a good bit the next day too.