Italian Wine? Priceless

Our time in Italy was highlighted by a visit to the distribution center for Araldica, the cooperative wine of our friend's family. I will tell the story in pictures. Below is me, Joe, and Valerio, the vineyard owner, at the distribution center. We thought it would just be a nice, touristy visit and an opportunity to buy some nice wine.

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Here I am  inside the store . I'm thinking 'let's buy some wine!'

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They took us downstairs to where the hug barrels of wine are stored as well as the archives-bottles of wine stored from each year of production. They are not for sale. They are kept as a history of the wine.

This is Mr. Manager after our friend's father, Valerio, told him to give us each a bottle from the archives from the year we were born!!!!! 30 year old bottles. '80, and '81. Not-for-sale stock. Wine. Can you hear our jaws dropping?!?!?

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There's part of the 1981 stock (my birth year). Un-be-liev-able.

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Love was in the air. Really, I wish you could smell this picture. The aroma of the wine was *ahem* intoxicating. Delicious. And before drinking this particular wine I wasn't a wine drinker. Turns out, I just like my wine to be Italian (sorry France!) and not cheap. Go figure.

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Here are our bottles when I got them home.

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Mr. Manager wrote the years on the bottles. See?

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Along with the priceless bottles of wine, Valerio also insisted we not pay for any other wines that we wanted. It ended up being about 30 bottles of wine that he gave us against our protests.

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So, Henry is now the new mascot for Araldica vineyards! Really, we are huge fans not just because they gave us free wine but because it's an excellent product. Tell your local wine seller to order some today! I could not find it in the States online. Tell me if you find it there!

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