jamie goode's wine blog: Heard on twitter: driving distance and wine styles

Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Heard on twitter: driving distance and wine styles

One of the USA's leading wine educators posted the following on Twitter this afternoon:

It is less than a 5hr drive to Bordeaux from Rioja, so it's no coincidence that Rioja wines often have a Bordeaux style

This sounded a bit dodgy, so I checked some driving times on Via Michelin to see if this driving distance/wine style premise held any water. I found the following:

  • Reims to Dijon takes 2 h 40
  • Nantes (Loire) to Bordeaux is 3 h 21
  • Beaune to Avignon (Southern Rhone) is 3 h 36.

19 Comments:

At 5:52 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

what's your point?

 
At 5:54 PM, Anonymous Simon said...

I travelled two hours west from Bordeaux, and found that what I was drinking had a definite salty tang - is this because Sanlucar isn't so very far away??

 
At 5:59 PM, Blogger Jamie said...

My point, anon, is that just because region a is 5 h drive from region b there is no reason to think the wine might have any similarity at all. Climates and terroirs change dramatically over much shorter distances.

 
At 6:13 PM, Anonymous Steve said...

Uh, who is this alleged 'educator'? Name and shame them. It's not exactly hidden that post-phylloxera, Bordeaux growers and merchants settled on Rioja as a source of wine, often importing their techniques. Not that they drove of course.

 
At 6:38 PM, OpenID ithacork said...

without going back to check, i bet it was Kevin Zraly. overgeneralizations like this are his forté. thanks for calling him out, jamie.

 
At 7:36 PM, Blogger Nerval said...

I think it's a 45 minutes drive from Vinho Verde to port country. No wonder these wines are nearly identical.
On the other hand, it's a couple of minutes by car or private chopper between chateaux where Michel Rolland consults, and there's a clear stylistic affinity. So there can be a link after all.

 
At 8:21 PM, Blogger Nick Oakley said...

You should issue a challenge - the greatest difference in style over the shortest distance. But the wine needs to be of same 'genre' i.e dry red compared with dry red, dry white with dry white, sweet white with same, etc.
Any takers?

 
At 8:23 PM, Blogger Wine Splodge said...

This post has been removed by the author.

 
At 10:21 PM, Blogger Chris Townend said...

My wine education is now complete! Draw a straight line between two regions, quote the travel time by car, and suggest a similarity! Bargain!

Its 10 hrs from the Rhienhessen to Bordeaux - and you can get white wine in both places...well pat me.

Can I have my MW now please?

 
At 4:59 AM, Blogger LeinsterBhai said...

I think this is symptomatic of our American friends who can tend to think of "Europe" as a singular place rather than a collection of very different countries.

 
At 6:15 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

THANKS JAMIE - the last comment about Americans is clearly hitting the nail on the head.

 
At 7:39 AM, Blogger bellabacchante said...

Found the post by searching for 'Bordeaux from Rioja twitter'.

A little surprised. o.0

 
At 7:42 AM, Blogger Alice said...

2 hours west of Bordeaux would put you in the ocean....?

 
At 7:47 AM, Anonymous Robert said...

I didn't see that post but certainly Kevin Zraly has said the same before and I did point out the lack of direct correlation then.

In his general defence, I would say that he is using twitter to generate interest in wines from around the world with his large US following, which is no bad thing, and there are only so many details one can get into 140 characters.

... but this is clearly a massive oversimplification even in those circumstances.

 
At 7:55 AM, Blogger WineLondon said...

Im not sure the character count really has much of an impact when stating 5 hours instead of perhaps more like 12 or 13 hours no?

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?daddr=Bordeaux,+France&geocode=CZCTH1tvNaBmFfgprAIdcDX3_w&dirflg=&saddr=Rioja&f=d&sll=44.837368,-0.576144&sspn=0.109311,0.263844&ie=UTF8&t=h&z=6

 
At 8:11 AM, Blogger Jamie said...

wine london - let's be fair here - your 12 h route is taking you down to the bottom of spain! From Logrono (Rioja region) to Bordeaux is actually 4 h 17 according to google maps!

 
At 8:12 AM, Blogger Jamie said...

Alice, yes, in the sea - that's Simon's irrepressible sense of humour for you - you get used to it after a while!

 
At 7:02 AM, Blogger Michael said...

Wow - I guess I never knew the Pyrenees were post post phylloxera - no wonder those Basques are so pissed - that's one hell of a speed bump!

 
At 7:57 PM, Blogger wilj said...

Fantastic logic. If a = b then c = d and e = f. Why take such a hard line? There's no denying that Bordeaux style wines are to be found in Rioja. I doubt (hope?) the referenced post was intended to be a wine maxim.

 

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