Two quick notes

[Frederick Blais]

Over the week end I had Quinta do Crasto Reserve 2003, still young but a very balanced and full of fruit wine. Creamy oaky texture but nothing too much there. Went very well with the grillades and all my friends really liked it.

Now the deal was the Quinta do Vesuvio 98. I did not have the 97 and 94 yet but every others since 92 and for me this one is second only to the 2000. It has huge structure and concentration, I always get charmed with a floral VP and this one was bursting with that on the palate and the nose. Tremendous effort on that off vintage from Symingtons. Thanks to my brother for popping this one, normally he does not buy any ports. He got this one at 25% rebate.

When I came back to buy a few more, I found some that where splashed by a bottle that broke in the case, I managed to get another 3 bottles at 50% They were now 35$ can, that's around 15 pounds, that made my day!!

[Tom Archer]

One wonders what happened to make a bottle break in the case...


Still that was a very good price - UK auction benchmark is about the same, but to that you have to add 10% BP and delivery.

UK retail price per bottle (inclusive of tax) is about £30.

It's curious to note how many declared vintage years recently have been followed by another good year - 2004, 2001, 1998 & 1995 have all been well reported, yet if you look further back there is no general tendency for good years to follow each other - it looks pretty random.

Tom

[Kurt Wieneke]

For Vesuvio, it seems hard to believe that an off vintage like '98 could be better than the '95, which has gotten rave reviews from Roy and others. I guess the UK shootout this fall will tell the tale regarding these Vesuvio vintages.