Campania Hill Towns and the Wines of Irpinia

The countryside here is just beautiful.  Tuscany gets all the publicity, but the Irpinia Hilltowns can certainly hold there own.  I'm glad I didn't have to drive these little two lane curving roads to get us from one small town to the next (thanks Mario).  

We visited three small producers.  Both the whites and the reds indigenous to each area were wonderful.  

We visited Cantine Antonio Caggiano in the town of Taurasi, the town is known for the deep red wine of the same name.  The son has now taken over the production and the estate is built into the hillside in a series of under ground caverns.  

Cantine di Marzo is in the town of Tufo.  The winery was also built into the hillside, which at one time was mined for sulphur.  The family has owned this old fortress turned winery for many generations and it was interesting to learn the history of all the feuding amoung the town folk as well as his various family lines.  He only took over 5 years ago and had previously lived in France working in the wine industry there.

The white wines here were fantastic, my favorite the Greco di Tufo.  This wine was used at the inaugural flight of the Boeing 787 celebration dinner.  We followed this with a nice lunch at a little restaurant at the top of the castle.

The last winery, Cantine Lonardo, was run by a young couple.  One of the vineyards had vines over 80 years old.  They had two single vineyard red wines which were fantastic and we bought them to try and bring home (we'll see if they make it).