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Irache wine fountain - 30,000+ bottles so far this year!

Bradypus

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The generosity of the owners of that winery is awe-inspiring.

They may get some good publicity, like this article, from what they do, but that can't possible make up for all the lost sales. They have single-handedly created one of the most iconic experiences on the CF for us peregrinos.

Our heartfelt thanks to them!
 
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On my 2017 Camino we passed the Irache fountain but tragically despite it only being 09:00 am there was no wine being dispensed. A couple of days later my Camino mate and I volunteered to cook a communal dinner in the Albergue in Najera. In the supermarket we saw some bottles of Irache so bought one to try. It was, quite frankly, awful, and so I felt that I had dodged a bullet.
 
John Crawford Howell said:
One would not expect the wine to be a rich fusion of brilliance with notes of blackberry, licorice, and toast. And it wasn't! Still, the gesture by Irache is notable, and I, for one, salute them for their generosity.
Click to expand...

Yep, tasted awful....... I suspect it's stuff they were not planning to bottle anyway.
 
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Robo said:
Yep, tasted awful....... I suspect it's stuff they were not planning to bottle anyway.
Click to expand...
Aah, come on … it’s a joven the new ferment from that years harvest ( think Beaujolais Nuveau for those who can’t spell French and hate cheap wine (a contradiction in terms if there ever was)). The stuff you get from the fuente Irache is about what you get which every menu Peregrino or as a bunch in every tourist trap from Madrid to Malaga.
What did you expect? A reasonable Crianza with a little character and perhaps some developing potential. Five years worth of careful nurture from raw ferment via barrique and barrel to bottle and careful cellaring?

The family, the family not some sodding vast conglomerate company, have a tradition, a long held tradition, of providing a slurp of vino to passing pilgrims. Pilgrims on the road to the bones of Santiago.
It cannot possibly be the fault of the Bodega Irache that everyone today is a wine critic or that every passing Pilgrim has a clearer understanding of their entitlement than the incompetents who open the tap every day
 
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Sorry, I did not mean to be over critical.

Only that any time I have tried it, it tasted really rough. Oxidised.
Not surprising of course, considering the way it is dispensed.

I'm sure the stuff that makes it into bottles is good.
I've never had a bad wine yet walking the Camino!

And I drink wines from that region at home...... the cheap stuff
 
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Unless it has changed since I was there, they put in a hundred liters a day. Maybe they hadn't gotten around to putting in the day's quota at 09:00. Or maybe the new owners are less generous. Last time I was hospitalero, a Venezuelan company bought them and raised the prices. We looked for and found another source.
 
I was happy to fill my cycling bidon with what so so generously provided and ride away. Can't say I recall much more about the wine (or the day... )
 
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Obviously, numerous pilgrims are not able to read, or at least not able to read Spanish, otherwise they would know that they are politely asked to take just a sip for a toast and not fill their bottles.

Here's some info you rarely find in Camino blogs:

Bodegas Irache, located in Ayegui, was founded in 1891, although its vineyards already supplied wine to the Royal House of Navarra since the 12th century thanks to the work of the Benedictine monks in the Monastery of Irache. It expanded production in 1918, again 1944, and then in 1970, and now produces more than 10 million litres per year.​
​
So measured in volume the wine fountain dispenses about 0,4 % of their annual production and presumably even less so when measured in € in production cost or turnover. I doubt that the wine fountain was the reason why they had to find a mega-rich investor a few years ago.
 

Exactly! That why it is empty so fast...........
 
Will be heading that way next March. Is there a store at the winery? Be good to purchase a bottle, after taking my sip.
 
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So one thing I learned from dining with Spanish pilgrims this year was that, when ordering menu peregrino and getting vino tinto for our drinks, they asked for gaseosa/limonada. Vino tinto/joven is not matured in barrel at all hence the acidity. So they poured a bit of “sprite” to take away the acidity and make it smoother. It was nice and I’ve been ordering that with my menu peregrino at no extra charge since!

So for the Irache fountain, maybe have a small bottle of lemonade (the traditional brand used is “La Casera”) at the ready

Other vino tinto/soda mixes: tinto de verano, a cocktail you can order in bars or buy in supermarket already pre-mixed. It’s one part wine and one part lemonade. So it tastes like Vimto. I don’t like it. There’s also kalimotxo which is 2/3 coke and 1/3 vino tinto.
 
Kathar1na said:
Obviously, numerous pilgrims are not able to read, or at least not able to read Spanish, otherwise they would know that they are politely asked to take just a sip for a toast and not fill their bottles.
Click to expand...
Well, the signs there are in both English and Spanish. Which means half of the Korean pilgrims can't read them. But most Europeans can. I was there one day when a car pulled up, four people speaking Spanish jumped out, each carrying two big jugs that they filled up and carried away.
 
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Robo said:
Yep, tasted awful....... I suspect it's stuff they were not planning to bottle anyway.
Click to expand...
It varies in quality from day to day, seemingly, and not every bottled Irache wine is the same either. The cheaper bottles are not as good as others, and should really only be taken as table wine with a meal, not drank on its own.
 
There wasn't a drop to be had from it when I passed at 3pm a few days ago. Whether it had been drank dry or they shut it off in the afternoon I will never know...
 
Flog said:
There wasn't a drop to be had from it when I passed at 3pm a few days ago. Whether it had been drank dry or they shut it off in the afternoon I will never know...
Click to expand...
I think that it probably gets emptied within a couple of hours in the morning as people fill their water bottles
 
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Normally I would say so, and when I last walked this path 6 years ago in September, there was a queue!
But it's very quiet now. At this time there are only a handful of people passing everyday..
 
PeteD said:
Obviously, numerous pilgrims are not able to read, or at least not able to read Spanish, otherwise they would know that they are politely asked to take just a sip for a toast and not fill their bottles.
Click to expand...
It amazes me how people can be incredibly greedy about something just because they can get it for free, and then complain that the quality is not up to their standard.

The winery should install a self-limiting dispenser to make it harder to take more than a shell-full at a time.
 
Robo said:
I think that it probably gets emptied within a couple of hours in the morning as people fill their water bottles
Click to expand...
My son and I each had a small cup of the wine. Then he decided to empty his water bottle and fill it with the wine. He no sooner had an inch in the bottom when the tap shut off. We laughed and said they employ someone to "spy" on the pilgrims to keep them from being greedy.
 
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Last time I was there, the spigot had to be worked back and forth. Each time it was turned, it only spit out about four CCs.
 
Lurch said:
Will be heading that way next March. Is there a store at the winery? Be good to purchase a bottle, after taking my sip.
Click to expand...
Not only a store, but a nice museum of old wine-making artifacts and a few other old things. And on the way to it from Ayegui, a blacksmith (if still there) makes all sorts of cool things. One of his items gave me an inspiration to sketch a design for a pair of bookends and ask him to make them. One has a pilgrim with a heavy load approaching a cross, and the other has him walking away from the cross with the burden left behind.
 
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