where cava comes in tanks

so, we went cava tasting. it was this super old winery (when its a cava place do you still say winery?) called codorniu. to get there we had to take the train about an 45 minutes outside of barcelona to the cutest little town (san sadeniu ardeniu?)...but when we got there we had no idea where exactly the winery was and even though it was a saturday nobody was around. everything was so amazingly quiet. after going to a competing winery to ask for directions and then walking around, we ended up going back to the train station and calling a taxi. we SO could have walked, i think, but the girls i was with were being wimpy and nervous.

the good part is that since we had some extra time before we needed to get to the winery, we got to play at a playground!! it, unfortunately, did not have a pyramid of death...but fun nonetheless

ok, so then we get there. and by cava tasting i really mean a crazy tour with a free glass of cava at the end. the place is crazy. our tour started out with this ridiculous brainwashing movie about how cordiniu wines and cava are the best and pretty much taking over the world. and then the guide took us through the gardens, and showed us the "family house" which was nothing close to what i would still consider house. maybe mansion. and then we walked by the museum, but couldn't go in cause they were preparing for some event. mostly, i was distracted by this...in the picture, do you see those blackish boxes on the right? that is all cava!! there were so many of those boxes too, they just kept popping up.

and then the cellars...which the guide kept calling caves, which i guess thats what they are, but it made me laugh a lot. also, keep in mind that in the group with us, were these men who had clearly been to a few other wineries before this one and were so drunk. they were rude in a hilarious way. thankfully, i dont think that the tour guide minded.

ok, so cellar time. and it was amazing, and basically they just showed off their ridiculous amount of cava and wine. they just kept going. we even had to take a little "train" ride to see parts of the cellars there are so many of them. it was just rows and rows of wine bottles stacked up on top of eachother. they also talked about how they make the wine a little, and how it has changed since back in the day. (did you know that to get the yeast particles out of the wine...after it settles in the neck, they freeze the neck and then it just pops out?! i want to see it so bad, but the bottling area was closed for the weekend).

and then came the tasting. basically it was just a free for all, where they placed a plate of crackers in the middle of a table (made from an old wine barrel) and handed everyone a glass. basically, the cava was good, the crackers were good, the day was good. what more would you expect?