It only took five months of licensing, contacting freight forwarders, interviewing customs brokers, and of course money for five cases of the 2010 Côtes Catalanes Old Vine Grenache Project Grenache to show up in Portland.  I am sure that sounds like a lot of time and work for five simple cases of wine to fly across the pond…and it was.  From the pickup at the warehouse in Rivesaltes it took two days to land in Vancouver BC.  Simple, no?  Then five days to find a truck to Portland, not quite as simple but finally on Wednesday the 22nd of August I was told that the wine was at Summit NW and ready for pickup…well, almost.

Naturally I was very excited to hear that the wine had finally arrived.  I had a lunch date that day and knew that it had to be a short one as I still had to drive to the airport (an hour away) and process the paperwork through customs which is just blocks from the warehouse.  I was told that I could do it myself as it was very straight forward.

Around 11:30 as I was getting ready to head to lunch David called.  He was in Portland for an appointment and when I bubbled over with the news he, as any decent loving partner would do, offered to grab the wine as he was about fifteen minutes away.  What a doll!

Of course I was not really surprised when the first call came about ten minutes into lunch.  And not really surprised at the second call, but the third, fourth, fifth…you get the idea.  Although I had been told that this was a very simple exercise in walking the paperwork over to customs to be signed off and then back to the warehouse for the wine this little exercise took over four hours!

And it included a trip to the OLCC (Oregon Liquor Control Commission)!!  This was never discussed at any time.  But there were taxes to pay, or not.  Thankfully it was David who went there as he is very well known and they took care of him right away.  I would still be sitting there waiting for my letter of approval.

The warehouse closes at 4:30 so imagine the relief at 4:20 when David arrived, with all the proper paperwork and the proper signatures and paid receipts to finally pickup the wine.  As he headed back to the dock he immediately noticed a smell that he knows and loves….yep, the sweet scent of grenache!

 

Seems that the warehouse guy was not the best on a forklift.

 

One bottle broken, eleven bottles with wine stained labels and four cases of samples to launch the search for a distribution network for OVGP.

Precious Packets of Docs

First Stop

Mug Shot Worthy of the Exercise

Hmmmmm, What Have We Here?????

First Glimpse of the Mess

More Damning Evidence

The Final Evidence!!