Viña Tabalí

One of the pioneers in the Limarí Valley in the 1990s was Viña Tabalí. Owned by Guillermo Luksic and San Pedro Tarpaca Group, this beautiful estate lies on the edge of a national park, Valle del Encanto (Enchanted Valley), where ceremonies and rituals were held by the ancient El Molle tribes.

The first vineyards were planted in 1993 and the winery built in 2002. Tucked into the contours of a shady ravine, it was designed and constructed to reflect the Molle way of living. In 2007 the company Viña Valles de Chile was formed, which holds Viña Tabalí and Leyda.

True to its pioneering spirit, Viña Tabalí has just planted the country’s first vineyard on a marine terrace just 12km from the sea. The new estate, nesting in a remote, previously uncultivated plot in the coastal hills, is the coolest in Limarí. Here Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Riesling have already been planted and next year one-hectare experimental blocks of Cabernet Franc, Petit Sirah, Petit Verdot, Syrah, Carignan and Mourvèdre will be planted.

The soil is composed of fossils and shells and is a porous, sponge-like limestone with active carbon calcium, which winemaker Felipe Muller East says is excellent for making fresh, elegant wines with natural acidity and powerful minerality. This is a very new and very different expression for Chile  “The region has a lot of different soils which makes it interesting for the future,” he says.

Viña Tabalí is still exploring the area and looking for further development opportunities. It believes this is the next big area for Chilean wine.
Producing 60,000 cases a year, the company says it wants to build its brand name through quality and expression rather than volume.

The winery’s logo, which features on all of its bottle labels – the Reserva Especial and Reserva (larger production) ranges - is one of the distinctive rock drawings to be found in the neighbouring Valle del Encanto.  

Below: Viña Tabalí winery built into a ravine

Tamaya

Viña Casa Tamaya was founded in 2001. The 210 hectare estate has 163 hectares under vine, the first planted in 1997, and a modern winery with a capacity of over 1.5m litres. The winery aims to produce around 60,000 9-litre cases a year of which approximately 90% is exported worldwide and the remainer distributed nationally.

Tamaya (meaning high lookout) is the name of the highest peak in the area and it comes from the Diaguita culture, which reigned in the zone between the 8th and 15th Centuries.

Tamays’s eye catching wine labels are clean, simple and elegant to reflect both the Indian (Diaguita) heritage and the essence of the Limarí Valley wines.

For even greater shelf presence, all the bottles have seen a redesign this year with a move into eco-friendly glass. The whites have got away from the traditional Bordeaux shape and the reds have a more elegant tapered shape made possible through the use of the thinner wall glass. The bottles, supplied by Cristalerias de Chile, the Chilean glass container manufacturer, have seen a weight reduction from 440g to 425g. Without the thinner glass the new shape would have made the bottles even heavier. But gone are the super-heavy bottles that most Chilean wineries still consider a sign of quality and continue to use for their smaller production icon wines.

This year the winery is planting more Pinot Noir and Syrah and chief winemaker José Pablo Martin is working on a methode champonaise Chardonnay blanc de blanc, which is presently still fermenting and will not be ready until 2011.


Below: Tamaya's chief winemaker José Pablo Martin