The natural winery of Azienda Agricola Vallecamonica: Nautilus and Adamadus, the sparkling wines refined in the depths of its fresh waters
Nautilus is the submarine starring in countless adventures of the famous “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” by Jules Verne. Since 2012, it was a special sparkling wine produced by the Azienda Agricola Vallecamonica. Aged in the waters of Lake Iseo, this two-year-old sparkling wine maintains a constant temperature of 5° thanks to the storage at 35-40 meters depth. Alessandro Belingheri, owner of the company explains the technique: “the result is a Traditional Method, Blanc de Noirs, only one year’s harvest. We started with a minimum of 12 months of refinement up to 48 months of this year. It was a necessity: we didn’t have a suitable cellar and an ideal system to keep the bottles at constant temperature and pressure. The balance achieved allowed us to create a Pas Dosè, without added sugar, and without compromising”. The Azienda Agricola Vallecamonica, founded in 2004, is known for its classic method, but attempted to make sparkling wine in lake waters. Thus, the Nautilus CruStorico is born from autochthonous red grapes coming from two vineyard plots in the municipality of Cividate Camuno. The first Nautilus was born in 2010 when, still to be refined, it was immersed to a depth of 40 meters in Lake Iseo. Constant pressure and temperature, together with total darkness, have recreated “the same conditions of the Baltic Sea where, in the same year, 168 bottles of champagne were found in the hold of a ship”.
After the Nautilus, Alessandro Belingheri created a new Classic Method: the Estremo Adamadus. It is immersed into a small glacial lake located in the Valle d’Aviolo, in the heart of the Adamello Park, 2000 meters high from Aviolo. This sparkling wine is literally lowered into the water as well. This particular positioning offered extreme conditions, with particularly cold and constant temperatures. In fact, a helicopter transports the bottles that are then immersed in the icy waters of the lake. A challenge that the company is happy to share with the territory, with the institutions and with all the people involved in the project.
