Vineyards
One of the main assets of Manzanos is the number of hectares of vineyard on the propertyVineyard extension
Protected by the appellation Rioja, Bodegas Manzanos owns 250 hectares in D. O. Ca. Rioja and controls 700 hectares more, 50 hectares in D. O. Navarra and controls 525 hectares more. The company sums up a total of 1.525 hectares.
To ensure a good quality in the grapes, we have made a significant investment to transform the goblet-trained vineyard into trellises. The plantation in trellises is allowing us to obtain vineyards with a good physiological balance that produces grapes of great maturity and high ecological potential.
This system has also allowed us to install drip irrigation in all the vineyards, with which we ensure the water stability of the plants and favor a better quality of the grapes.
The harvest is mechanized throughout the vineyard in trellises, with special grape harvesters that exhaustively select the grape in its optimum state of maturity.
As for the climate, the climatic conditions, with wet and cold winters and dry and hot summers, and rainfall of less than 300 litres per square metre, are optimal for vine health, harmonious maturity and quality viticulture, situated to obtain great wines.
In Bodegas Manzanos we have vineyards in the different sub-areas of the appellation Rioja. Each area and each appellation Rioja valley has its own singularities that depend to a large extent on the interrelation between climate‑land‑plant, without forgetting the importance of the production and elaboration techniques developed by the technical team, led by Borja Ripa, oenologist and technical director of Manzanos Wines. The combination of these factors is what determines the uniqueness of each wine.
The different terrains, the climate and the differences between varieties favor diversity and allow us to create wines that show the potential and characteristics of each sub-area.
In the Rioja Alavesa area, the influence of the Atlantic climate predominates and the clay calcareous soils are located in terraces and small plots. Here the vineyards are goblet trained, such as a pre-phyloxera vineyard that is more than 170 years old and a selected production depending on the year, of 5,400 bottles and manual harvesting.
In the Rioja Alta, also of Atlantic climate, the soils are distributed among clay-calcareous, clay-ferrous and alluvial. We have goblet trained vineyards and a vineyard from 1936 with more than 80 years of antiquity, harvested manually and with a limited production of 28,000 bottles.
The Rioja Oriental has a drier and warmer climate due to the Mediterranean influence, where alluvial and clay-ferrous soils predominate. The lower contrast in temperature between day and night-time gives a more balanced ripening and allows us to get high quality grapes in this area. The vineyards are divided between the towns of Aldeanueva de Ebro, Alfaro, Azagra and San Adrián, all less than ten minutes away from Bodegas Manzanos, whereupon the grapes arrive to the winery in an unbeatable state.
As for the red varieties, we cultivate four of the five that Rioja hosts and one of the most prestigious to this appellation: Tempranillo, Garnacha, Graciano and Mazuelo, and in white grapes we work with Viura and Chardonnay.
The Tempranillo is the quintessentially native grape of the Designation, which has conferred to Rioja wines an identity of its own. Here, this grape has demonstrated its good adaptability to the climatology and soils, that translate into the elaboration of wine of the highest quality.
It occupies more than 75% of the growing area and is a grape capable of producing long ageing wines, well balanced in alcoholic percentage, color and acidity, and with a smooth and fruity palate that evolves velvety when it ages.
The other native variety is Graciano, a minor grape but one that is setting a trend in Rioja. Notably, in Bodegas Manzanos we own 20% of all the hectares of graciano of the appellation Rioja.
This variety has a great relevance for us. It complements our most selected tempranillos in the Reservas and Gran Reservas, providing them with body, structure, aroma and colour, and we elaborate single-varieties from the most emblematic graciano vineyards, such as the old vineyard of San Adrián , the oldest of the appellation Rioja.
The Garnacha and Mazuelo varieties, the other two red grapes we work with, complement each other very well. The garnacha produces very vigorous wines and the mazuelo contributes to acidity and low levels of oxidation.