Dry Wine

On the way down in the airplane the tiny strip of land between the Andes and Pacific ocean is optimistically green on the topographical display. On the way down the Pan-American “highway” leaving Lima there are water towers that proclaim “Agua para todo” (water for everyone).

The swirling sand dunes are just about the only sign of life in most of Peru’s south western coast besides the buses and trucks that fly by regularly. Every 50 miles patches of green appear and inevitably a town clusters around the river flowing down from deep in the mountains or maybe from an oasis. The villages, towns, cities are as large as they can be without draining the water supply dry. In the drier streambeds people farm cactus and in the more verdant area they grow corn, sugar, and (barely) grapes.

In the south coast city of Ica, Peru, they stick to growing grapes. Along the sides of the road old women sell heaps of grapes and songs are written about the grape brandy Pisco. In the most rustic form the grapes are converted to red concoctions of varying strengths and sold in glass jugs in small convenience shops, bodegitas, with names like “mi amor”. A step up from that is the small bodega where grapes are brought in from a farm and off-loaded. In these “artisanal” wineries, the grapes are still crushed by foot and the equipment is made from rough-hewn wood. Lastly, we have the commercial bodega which thinks that foot-crushing is dirty and instead uses expensive machinery and giant barrels, making wine and Pisco to sell around Peru and the world.

The south coast of Peru is a harsh climate that has somehow managed to support sophisticated life for over 2000 years. We can see how they get by nowadays, but before they were able to make Pisco we aren’t quite sure how they did it. They built aqueducts that have been in use for 1200 years but until the Spaniards showed up 450 years ago they were stuck drinking fermented corn juice. We like it better now.