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Dear All,

next year's Essencia do Vinho (http://www.essenciadovinho.com) will take place in Porto from the 28th of February to the 2nd of March (I asked for the date in an e-mail). There one has all Portwine and all the rest of the portuguese wine world right in one single spot.
I will be in Porto from 26th of February to the 4th of March. Now tasting and going to lodges is much more fun in a group.
So is anyone planning to come along to Porto with me? I hope to form a small group.

Best wishes frome Cologne

Andre

The website is all in Portuguese... What is this event - is it primarily trade or public facing?

The Essencia do Vinho is Portugal's biggest wine fair. According to their website, they had 20.000 visitors this year, 350 producers were offering 3000 wines to taste. The fair is open to the public. If I remember correctly, the admission fee was 5 Euros a day (you could keep the wine glass).The event always takes place in the Palácio da Bolsa:
http://www.palaciodabolsa.pt/en/palacio-da-bolsa or http://www.palaciodabolsa.pt/en/palacio-da-bolsa
The Palácio da Bolsa is next to the IVDP-Headquarters.
If you search "Essencia" on the Port Forum, you can read Axel's reports from his visits to the Essencia of the last years.
I went there in 2012 and tasted appr. 50 wines each day. Almost every port house is there and offers almost their complete range (including the latest VPs and Colheitas). To give you an example, at Kopke you could taste their range of 10, 20, 30 and 40 Year White Tawnies. For Taylor's, I remember the 09 VP (which was their latest VP in 2012). I could give more examples, but do not have my notebook at hand, in which I made notes at the time. In 2014, visitors will probably be offered the 2011 Vintage to try by each house.
I hope this gives a more detailed picture of what the Essencia is about.

It sounds like a lot of fun. I'll check my diary.

Here's a dedicated website, in English:
http://www.essenciadovinhoporto.com/en/

Although that website can't decide whether the event is on the 7th or the 27th of February....

Thanks for the link to the English version of their website.
I supose the program flyer with the different date is still that of last year.
But I sent them an e-mail and asked for an explantion.
I'll keep you in the loop.

AW77 wrote:Thanks for the link to the English version of their website.
I supose the program flyer with the different date is still that of last year.
But I sent them an e-mail and asked for an explantion.
I'll keep you in the loop.

Thanks!

The fair is absolute brilliantly organised by the team of Essencia do Vinho. Nuno Pires being the overall director and Jose Santos is the Marketing and Communication Manager. I have been with these guys since 2005 (for the second EV, the first one was in 2004) and it is perfect ever since then. The Palacio da Bolsa is a fantastic venue for this, maybe the best to host a fair in the world (although I did not see all).

What is absolutely amazing about this fair in details are the "side-tastings". It all starts with the voting of the best Portuguese White and Reds and Ports. This is Thursday Morning, lasting some three hours. You need to be accredited for this.

Furhtermore they are organising tastings with special subjects. E.g. last year was the famous Scion, Tributa, 5G and Niepoort VV tasting with a Krohn 1863 Colheita and an Andresen 1910 aside.

Before that they celebrated the200th birthday of DAAF, where Luis Sottomayor presented very old Ferrreira Garrafeiras dating back to 1834.

For these tastings you need to be registered though.

Axel