Sula Vineyard - Nasik

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Being a wine lover, I dint need any encouragement to travel to Sula. So, when plans were being made to spend the weekend at Nasik to visit the Sula Vineyard, my nomination as a part of the tour was confirmed.

About twenty of us left from Mumbai in a small white mini bus cramped with our bags and photography equipment as early as 6:30 am from the southern part of Mumbai to undertake a long three and a half hour rickety bus journey to reach Nasik which is about 170 kms from Mumbai. A non-eventful drive through the ghats and toll booths got us to the wine capital of India. Our only stop till Nasik was the breakfast break when hunger pangs became louder than the perpetually blaring horn. However once we reached the outskirts of Nasik, we stopped about 7 times to figure out the address to our hotel which was barely 5 mins away. Six of these were by choice and the last one by the local cop. The oversight of our bus driver who perhaps thought it was cool to break a signal away from Mumbai was certainly not overlooked by the traffic police . Another ten minutes were lost in convincing him to accept a bribe so that we could finally reached our hotel - and yes, the cop accepted the bribe and then gave us directions to reach there!

Taking thirty minutes to check into our rooms and freshen up, we all headed right for Sula. All the enthusiasm that had dwindled with the long journey sprung back as we saw the sigh boards pointing us to the vineyard.

Sula in Nasik is one of the most popular and accessible winery. It is an extensive property running into acres of lush green grape trees. Also, the wine is made and bottled at the same location. We opted for the escorted tour of the winery, including touring the processing rooms and tasting varied wines. We were told about the grapes grown here, how the wines got thier specific names; how white and red wine is processed and bottled separately. Most of us were weighed down with the pungent reek of fermenting grapes and honestly I was glad to leave the processing room and step out into the greenery again.

Back to the tasting room, we had fun. Twenty of us lined up against the bar counter and had the wine glasses arranged before us. Guess, group dynamics work best at the bar when wine is being served. We all waited patiently while we were served but then the six glasses were tucked in quickly - dont think most of us paid any attention to the aesthetic surroundings.

There are plenty of other tempting wine varieties to choose from such as chenin blanc, sauvignon blanc, cabernet sauvignon, shiraz, etc. Somewhere between wines, crackers and 'bar' jokes we were all in high spirits and proceeded for a group picture. Now when you want to get twenty odd people who have swiped up 120 snips of wine amongst themselves; its not easy to get them to settle down for pictures. However, humor is the answer to all our lifes problems. We managed to get four nice group photos. Seemed like an achievement then.

After this we all went for lunch to Little Italy; the restaurant on the Sula property. Its an open air Italian place which served us amazing wood fired pizza. The pasta, lasagne and risotto were as good, if not better. We could not help finish our meal with the chocolate walnut fudge. Precisely what happens everytime there are four women at the table.

It was already late in the evening, so we just settled down on the lush grass and watched a spectacular sunset over the hills into the river. Away from the noise and bustle of the city, in the calm green surroundings gazing out across the horizon, the feeling of contentment came easily. We delayed our return and stretched going back as much as possible. Finally when all of us ran out of all possible excuses, we reluctantly gathered back into the bus and back on our way to the hotels where we could not stop discussing the events of the day.

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Comments

[Ara]

The photos look great. Thanks for sharing!