Guimaro - Ribeira Sacra Blanco 2022

Cultivated since Roman times, Ribeira Sacra’s steep terraced vineyards are some of the most picturesque and treacherous to work in the world of wine – think of the Douro, Cote Rotie, or the Mosel.  Like those most dramatic terruños, winegrowing here is not for the faint of heart; it takes spirited determination, eternal optimism, a sense of tradition, and a willingness to collaborate.  Pedro Rodríguez of Adegas Guímaro embodies all of these qualities.

Pedro Rodríguez of Adegas Guímaro descends from a long line of winegrowers working in the Amandi area, Ribeira Sacra’s most prime subzone of perilously steep south facing vineyards planted on local Losa slate, just above the river Sil. The previous generation, his parents Manolo and Carmen, still work with him in the vines. They named their winery Guímaro (meaning “rebel” in Gallego) when they established it in 1991.In the past, Pedro’s family had produced small quantities of wine for their own consumption and sold their wine in garrafones - 20-liter glass containers - to local cantinas. In the early 1990s, they began to bottle their wines, and Guímaro was one of the first adegas to join the Ribeira Sacra appellation when it was founded in 1996. Like other traditional winemaking regions of inland Galicia, the area was in steep decline until the early 1990s. Pedro’s winemaking has been and is resolutely traditional: for the single vineyard wines, they employ wild yeast fermentation, foot treading in open-top vessels, stem inclusion, low sulfur additions, and fermentation and aging in used foudre.

This wine is made with Godello from a mix of older vineyards around Amandi that are planted on slate soils at 300-350m elevation. Most of the vines are over 50 years old. The grapes were harvested by hand and fermented in temperature controlled stainless steel tank with native yeasts. Malolactic conversion was blocked, and the wine rested in tank before bottling without fining or filtering.

Producer: Guimaro

Country: Spain

Region: Galicia

Varietal: Godello

Appellation: Ribeira Sacra

Vintage: 2022

Size: 750ml