Port anD the Douro 143An air of dampness pervades the city, penetrating buildings so that patches of mould grow
on the walls if rooms are not regularly aired. This atmosphere is eminently suitable for
the maturation of wine and it is here, rather than in the Douro, that the Port shippers
inevitably chose to set up their cellars. They are not ‘cellars’ in the true sense of the word,
for Port is generally aged above ground. The British shippers refer to their ‘lodge’, a term
that derives from the Portuguese word ‘loja’ meaning shop, store or cellar. The Portuguese
themselves tend to use a more accurate term, armazém (plural armazéns), which translates
as ‘warehouse’ or ‘storehouse’.
The long, low red-roofed lodges or armazéns that stack up from the river bank in Vila
Nova de Gaia serve both as headquarters for the majority of Port shippers and storehouses
for a huge quantity of Port. Most of the wine ages in wooden vats and casks ranging
in capacity from balseiros, vertical vats holding as much as 100,000 litres to casks of
around 600 litres (so-called ‘lodge pipes’). They function as vessels for ageing where the
permeability of the wood permits a gradual, controlled oxidation of the contents. Wines
destined for bottling after two or three years – premium ruby, LBV and vintage – will be
aged partly in balseiros and sometimes in stainless steel to preserve the primary character
of the fruit. Wines set aside to become old tawnies are transferred to smaller lodge pipes
to enhance the oxidative character of the wine.
Apart from a number of vats made from macacauba (Brazilian mahogany) and a few
Italian chestnut casks, nearly all the wood utilised for the maturation of Port is oak. This
is favoured over other types of wood for its tighter grain, thereby reducing evaporation
and enabling a more gradual oxidation. Much of the oak used for ageing Port originated
from Memel and Stettin in the Baltic state of Lithuania before it was occupied by the
former Soviet Union in 1939. More recently oak has been obtained from New Orleans in
North America and from northern Portugal, although with no forest management policy