Colchagua is fast becoming the Napa of Chile, especially the tiny district of Apalta — a small, moon-shaped internal valley hard up against the Coastal Range.
This is where Neyen, Viña Montes's Alpha M and Lapostolle's Clos Apalta are sourced, and all three are Chilean icon wines, each with dozens of international awards and high scores from critics.
Colchagua is one of the five sub-valleys of the Valle Central and, with the Maipo Valley, one of the two most renowned; it is from these two districts that most of Chile's so-called icon wines are sourced. (Colchagua and neighbouring Cachapoal are sometimes referred to together as the Rapel Valley.)
Chile's newer, high-priced icon cabernets and cabernet blends are polished wines with much more concentrated and complex flavours and firmer structure than the country's moderately priced bottlings.
