A Day Trip to a Vineyard

So this weekend was a lot more low-key than the past couple of weeks which I just figured out that we've officially been here for almost 20 days, crazy how time flies. But as I said in my last post on Friday we went wine tasting which was GREAT. I can't wait to go in Italy but this was a great start, a big group of us all bused it out about an hour away where we received a tour of the vineyard and explanations of how they make the wine and cava (champagne- we learned that "champagne" is actually reserved only for a certain type made in a specific part of Italy so here it's referred to as cava!) After the tour and informational session it was our turn to sample the wines and cavas! (definitely dangerous at 2pm on a Friday). One of the most interesting parts of the entire experience was visiting the cava cellar where they all sit to accumulate all of the settlements before the tilt them into the neck of the bottle and freeze them into a small piece of ice which is removed from the bottle! Anyways, the cellar was too dark to get really good pictures but here are some others from our trip: 

Exterior: 

The Vineyard (obviously not a prime season haha)

 Me with a bunch of barrels of red wine where they sit for years to age:

 The group during the tasting:

 Meg, Me, and Emily sampling some cava!

 Emily displaying how to let my red "breathe" and showing me how the veins determine the quality of the wine:

This trip to the vineyard was such a good way to get a taste of some of Spain and more specifically Barcelona's local wine. Now I can better understand the different qualities of the different types of wine and can appreciate it's pairings with the different dishes that we eat.