Spain and Portugal for Visitors

Oporto's most famous product, port wine or simply port is actually made a hundred or so kilometres away, upstream in the Upper Douro Valley. It is a fortified wine, like sherry, which is largely because they were developed at around the same time, in the 17th to 19th centuries, when various conflicts and wars between Britain and France meant it was difficult for British wine drinkers to get their hands on French wine.

'Fortified' refers to the fact that the fermentation of the wine is halted by the addition of a neutral alcohol like brandy or aguardente. Halting the fermentation in this way affects the nature of the wine. First, it makes a strong drink, around 20º. Secondly, not all the grape sugar has been fermented into alcohol, so it is at least slightly and sometimes very sweet. Third (and this is the reason for the whole process), it will withstand being shipped much more readily without spoiling.

The wine made in this way is transported downriver, traditionally by the canoe-like rabelo boats, later by railway and nowadays by tanker lorry, to Oporto and the port wine lodges of Vila Nova de Gaia. Here the wine is aged, blended and bottled as required before being shipped overseas.

There are three basic types of port: white, ruby and tawny. White port used to be far less common than red, but has become fashionable in recent years. It is made from white grape varieties (castas in Portuguese) like Malvasia or Verdelho: others are Esgana-Cão, Folgasão, Rabigato, and Viosinho. White port is not aged as much as red port (with certain exceptions) and is ready to drink when bottled - further aging is not desirable. It comes in varying degrees of sweetness and should always be served chilled.

Ruby and tawny port are essentially the same red wine, made from red grape castas like Tinta Barroca, Tinta Cão, Tinta Roriz (known as Tempranillo, e.g. in Spain), Touriga Francesa, and Touriga Nacional, among others. The difference between them lies in how they are aged.

Ruby port is aged in large, sealed vessels and perhaps in the bottle, both processes which keep air away from the wine - they are referred to as "reductive" aging, where the different substances involved "lose" oxygen. The aging process occurs very slowly, but is usually complete when the wine is bottled, in other words, no further aging is desirable.

Tawny port is aged in smaller, oak casks  before bottling, and the porosity of the wood means air gets into the wine, causing oxidation (and even evaporation), so this is called "oxidative" aging. The legnth of aging depends on what the finished product is intended to be - in the case of cheap tawnies with no indication of age, it may be very little, but in the case of a tawny reserve, it is at least seven years. An aged tawny is a blend of different wines of different ages, the average being at least the specificed number of years: 10, 20, 30 or 40. A colheita is a tawny made from the grapes of a single harvest, aged for at least seven years and labelled with its year of bottling, but is not a vintage port as we shall see, and does not generally improve with further aging.

Which brings us to vintage port, the most prestigious of all, and the one with most mystique. A vintage port is simply a red port made entirely from the grapes of a particular harvest, an especially good one. Vintage wine - most port houses declare around three vintage years a decade - is first approved by the regulatory board, the IVDP (Instituto dos Vinhos do Douro e Porto), when the wine is two years old. It may be barrel-aged for only a little longer, a year at most, before being bottled, and the aging process continues slowly in the bottle. This means vintage ports require bottle-aging, and continue to improve for years or decades. Sediment forms during the aging process, so the wine will need to be decantered before it is drunk.

Even more exclusive, though sometimes made from the wine of an unexceptional harvest, is single quinta vintage port, made from the grapes of a single harvest and from one vineyard.

Late-bottled vintage (LBV) port is wine which, as the name suggests, is barrel-aged for longer before bottling. It may be filtered before bottling - if not, it will probably improve with some further aging, though not the decades ordinary vintages require.

Drinking Port
Port is most traditionally a digestif wine, and though the port wine sector in general is anxious to modernize its image, first-class port is still best drunk with cheese at the end of a meal. Once opened, however expensive, a bottle of port needs to be drunk almost straight away, within the following 48 hours at most. There is nothinng wrong with chilling even a really good port slightly - about 18ºC is a good temperature to aim for, slightly cooler than modern homes ever become - the easiest way to achieve it without expensive wine cabinets and such is by leaving the bottle in the fridge for only a short time, or keeping it in the garage or on the window-ledge, depending on the weather. Less exalted tawny or ruby port wine will benefit if drunk at about 16ºC, and a white port should be decidedly chilly, say 10ºC.

As I say, the port wine sector is determined to rejuvenate its image, which these days means making products suitable for mixing. This is particularly the case with white port, some new brands of which are expressly intended for drinking before a meal (one such is "Aperitif") and in Oporto itself, it is fashionable to mix it with tonic over ice and lemon - ask for a "Porto-tonic."

The Port Trade and Oporto
The Marquês do Pombal regulated the Upper Douro wine region in 1756. Wine from the region was already being exported, especially to England and especially following the Methuen Treaty of 1703. England was a greedy consumer of port and sherry wines, mostly because it was practically constantly at war with France. Vila Nova de Gaia, facing Oporto on the left bank of the Douro, had become the centre of this wine aging and shipping trade, and merchants from all over Europe, especially Britain, set up shop there. In many cases they carried on an import-export business, bringing in woollen cloth and sending back wine.

It is highly unusual for the capital of a wine region and the place that gives it its name to actually be in a different place, indeed I cannot think of another example. But even more unusually, Oporto is not only the capital of the Douro Wine region (which, after all, occupies the same geographical space as the Port Wine region), but the capital of the Vinhos Verdes region of the Minho. Which brings me to:

Enotourism, Oenotourism, or Wine Tourism
The big attraction for wine tourists in Oporto itself is the wine lodges of Vila Nova de Gaia, Gaia for short, the cellars where the port wine is stored, aged, bottled and aged some more. They are signposted as the "Caves," which is not a bad description, and at a rough estimate, there are around two dozen of them, few newer than pre-War (First World War, that is), and some from the beginning of the 19th century. Even the most business-like of them are highly atmospheric places and most enjoyable to visit. Practically all the port lodges offer some kind of guided tour which you usually sign up for when you turn up on the doorstop. Some are free, some charge a token price, and I believe all offer a wine tasting at the end of the visit. The big question you will be asked when you arrive is "In which language would you like your visit?" The English and Scottish port houses may not offer other languages than English and Portuguese, and, paradoxically, Portuguese lodges may not have an available English-speaking guide, as they tend to cater to French or Dutch visitors.

The wine tasting at the end of your visit is normally of two samples, perhaps a white port and a tawny, maybe even a reserve, and you will often be asked first whether prefer your port sweet or dry. You are not likely to get sozzled, but do bear in mind that port's sweetness belies its strength - if you do two or three port lodge visits in a single morning or afternoon, you could be well over the limit for driving without realizing.

Away from Oporto, the Upper Douro valley is most attractive and also a draw for wine tourists. It is a World Heritage site, and for once I find the UNESCO "Justification for Inscription" almost as enticing as the best-written travel brouchure:
"Criterion iii. The Alto Douro Region has been producing wine for nearly two thousand years and its landscape has been moulded by human activities. Criterion iv. The components of the Alto Douro landscape are representative of the full range of activities association with winemaking – terraces, quintas (wine-producing farm complexes), villages, chapels, and roads. Criterion v. The cultural landscape of the Alto Douro is an outstanding example of a traditional European wine-producing region, reflecting the evolution of this human activity over time."

The possibilties for exploring the area are myriad, from organized tours (which can be excellent value for money) and Douro cruises to DIY motoring holidays. One option often overlooked is the railway. The Linha do Douro follows the river from Oporto to Pocinho, about 160 kilometres, with a number of places where you could get off and spend the night. Or again, some organized tours will sail you upstream in a rabelo (or something like one) then chuff-chuff you back down in an antique train. The railway line often clings to the side of the river gorge, offering views you simply cannot get from the road. Other railway lines of interest are those of the Corgo and Tua lines which follow those tributaries of the Douro.