A far better travelled, more learned and gastronomically discerning adventurer than me, the late

Anthony Bourdain, once said that any reasonable sentient person who looks at Spain comes to

Spain, eats in Spain, drinks in Spain, is going to fall in love.

As he then went on, otherwise, there's something deeply wrong with you.

Spain's a sort of place that never really made any sense anyway, and in a very best possible

way.

From a wine lovers point of view, that certainly rings true. With over 400 grape varieties,

it is a diverse and baffling land, and one that every summer we have the privilege of

exploring on the Werthai, Spain. This year, our daily coverage of the race starting

in Barcelona on August 26th, and ending in Madrid on September 17th, goes by the name

El Clásico, and nod to another time-honored Spanish sporting fixture. And as every year,

we've put together a case of six wines from on or close to the route with our friends

from divine sellers of London.

In this episode, please switch off here if you come to the cycling podcast for cycling,

cycling only, and have no interest in knowing your rios from your Rivera's. You'll hear

me discussing and tasting the selection with Angus MacNab, divine's resident Spanish

wine Eficionado, and Guru. We were in the rather echoey divine underground tasting bunker,

pouring, clinking, and slurping, and you'll hear a bit of that in my audio in particular,

but hopefully it won't detract too much from your listening pleasure.

The case itself is available in the UK from divine sellers at www.divincelars.com, that's

the letter D, vincelars.com, and you'll find the names of the wines and information on

how to order in the show notes. Just finally, and Angus and I do also touch on this in the

...