Godelia Viernes Mencia 2020

Godelia is a young project, at least in its present form. Its wines come from a combination of very old schist-soiled mountain vines and maturing vines from the clay hill-slopes in the centre of the valley. About 30 of the 50 hectares which go into production of Godelia were planted in 1989 by a former owner, who traded under a different brand name. Godelia as such came into being when Vicente Garcia Vasquez, the optometrist of Cacabelos, purchased these holdings in 2009.

Cacabelos is a town smack bang in the middle of the valley floor, midway along the old highway from Ponferrada in the south to Vilafranca del Bierzo in the north. The Castillo Plateau to which these villages belong is a microclimate well-suited to viticulture.

Featuring lovely red dirt smell of the clay, Viernes has cherry-plum fruit laced with dark cooking spices (clove, nutmeg, pepper corn). The palate of soft purple juicy fruit is touched with gentle choc-earth tannin throughout. There's a lovely ringing sweet allspice corralling all and neat soft acid at the back achieves freshness and vitality to close.

The name celebrates Viernes, Friday!  In each case of 12 bottles there are 4 different labels celebrating the end of the week:  a dancer, a guitar, a jukebox and a jacket.