South Americans know how to throw a party, and almost before the first grape has been picked, the harvest is being celebrated with wine festivals across the Southern Cone.
Traditionally the fiesta de vendimia (harvest festival) was a small celebration in the villages to celebrate the end of the harvest and a good vintage – the bigger the crop, the bigger the party. But today’s harvest festivals are far more elaborate with mammoth theatre productions, decadent wine tastings and VIP tickets sold months in advance.
Ica, Peru: Second week of March
Peru is the first wine country of South America and while production is mainly focused on Pisco today, in order to distill Pisco you have to make a lot of wine first.
Although Peru’s harvest celebrations date back to pre-Incan times, the annual wine harvest festival has only been held since 1958 and attracts an influx of revellers who come to greet the new harvest queen and taste fresh cachina (partly-fermented must) before moving onto the stronger aguardientes and mistela (fortified must). Music, grape-stomping and bountiful Peruvian cuisine are all part of this Pisco-fuelled festivity in Peru’s main wine region…
Read the full article on Decanter
