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Waddesdon Wine Club: Colchagua Valley - Chile
The Colchagua Valley, located in central Chile, is one of the country's most celebrated wine-producing regions, renowned for its ideal climate and diverse terroirs. With its warm days and cool nights, it is particularly famous for producing exceptional red wines, such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère, and Syrah.
Chile’s climate variation is enormous. From the driest place on Earth, the Atacama desert, to the temperate rainforests of the south. The nation offers some of the best value-for-money wines on the market. Chile has access to cheap land and labour, and a Hispanophone population that can share expertise with Spanish winemakers, and from winemakers across the Andes in Argentina. Historically, it has been far more economically and politically stable than its neighbour since the 1980s, helping to attract large amounts of foreign investment into its wine industry, during the 80s, 90s and 00s. Chile’s wine industry is very mature and well developed, but with future potential in the far south due to a warming climate.
Chile’s most important wine growing region is the Central Valley. Sandwiched between the Andes mountains and the Pacific ocean, the region benefits from cold, humid air off the Humboldt Current, as well as coastal marine breezes that often form low-lying clouds. Simultaneously, cold air also comes off the Andes. These cooling influences mitigate the warm climate that the region experiences during the day. Ensuring an optimal diurnal temperature range that preserves acidity in the grapes, whilst ensuring they are fully ripe.
Within the Central Valley, there are various sub regions located within the region. One of these is Colchagua, within the O’Higgins province. The valley’s soil is generally a mixture of silt, granite, and clay, providing good drainage for the vines as well as mineral nutrients. Colchagua specialises in Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère and Syrah, as well as skin-contact ‘orange’ wines, rosés and sparkling wines. It has long been a fashionable wine growing region, hosting Domaine de Lafite’s own ‘Los Vascos’ estate. Established in 1988 Colchagua’s specialism in Cabernet Sauvignon as a region made it ideal for Domaines Barons de Rothschild (Lafite) who themselves deeply understood Cabernet, coming from the Medoc region in Bordeaux.
Written by Tom Lovell