Vineyards can be found a few hours from Lima, with a rich history dating back to 1540. Did I mention they are also generous with their tastings?
When the Spanish conquered Peru, it didn’t take long for them to start growing grapes to make familiar vineyards to make delicious wine. In fact, it only took them five years to get started. They began in Ica, where the climate is dry all year round but managed to invent a functional water system that would allow the many types of grapes to flourish.
Today, you can visit many wineries that are as beautiful as they are tasty. All of them have rich history from the colonial days and many of their historical reminisce are still present. I recently went on a winery adventure, and these were the three vineyards that we went to visit:
1. Tacama
Tacama was the first winery that the Spanish created in 1540- that’s only five years after conquering Peru! By 1821, the vineyard became a monastery owned by the San Agustín de Ica Convent. Today, the architecture still remains as it did when the monastery was active and the church with its original Spanish tiling is still open to observe.
By the 1920s the vineyard was introduced to French wine technology and methods, which are still being used today. They specifically hired French wine experts to improve the quality of the wine. Our guide gave us an excellent tour of the area, and then we watched an informative video that explained how they used to process the wine.
One fun fact that stuck with me was the storage barrels needed to be placed ten feet underground to keep the wine cool. After all, this is in a desert! The vineyard itself is a beautiful and relaxing area where we could enjoy delicious appetizers and some sparkling wine that we enjoyed under white gazebo tents.
2. Portón Pisco
Our next stop was Portón Pisco– the famous pisco distillery. It is one of Peru’s highest quality pisco, and its distillery was the most impressive to me. It was established in 1563, and today, you can still see the original machinery they used to process the pisco.
The vineyard was known as a hacienda: Hacienda La Caravedo. We entered into the new section from the opposite side of the old machinery where we saw the current production. There were vineyards everywhere, and our guide gave us an informative tour of the different grapes used there.
There were oddly many gangs of peacocks hanging out in the vineyards, too. After our tour, we were given a generous pisco tasting that included four different shots as well as a chilcano before we left.
3. Nietto
The last stop was at Nietto, another pisco distillery that was founded in 1856. They had a mix of pisco and wine that were filled with very sweet and milky flavors. Think of dessert wine, and that would be the sweetness level. They were tasty in small quantities, and they gave an excellent and thorough explanation of the flavors. The flavors ranged from coffee, strawberry, floral, etc. We did not see any visible vineyards in our visit as the customer area was more of a tourist-decorated bodega.
After a boozy escapade through the vineyards, we were off to the sand dunes where we went glamping, which is basically fancy camping, and you can read about it here.
