Herdade Vale d’Évora is located a few kilometers from the beautiful village of Mértola, in the lower Alentejo. The 550-hectare property located in the Vale do Guadiana Natural Park enchants with its landscape of great beauty. It is a wild game reserve, an immensity of hills and undulating terrain that meander the Guadiana river and very close to the village of Mértola. Visiting the estate is like a safari, seeing rabbits, hares, partridges, and even the Iberian lynx. At the same time, this is a wild beauty, with a harsh climate, where the poor shale soils and the scarcity of water mean that the vine lives on the edge, in a constant struggle for survival.
It is the proximity of the Guadiana river that brings some moderation and provides the fundamental acidity to the final balance of the wines that are made here.
Despite its long winemaking tradition, Mértola is a hunting destination par excellence. And the arrival of Paulo Alho, a native of Sesimbra, with a professional activity in civil construction, happened precisely because of hunting. Hunting enthusiasts have been visiting these parts for several decades and decided to purchase this property in 2007. The first objective was to explore this tourist hunting reserve, preserve it, reforest it and create some livestock activity.
Later, in 2009, the family – Miguel, son of Paulo Alho, is the executive director, supported by the whole family and by Nuno Vieira Martins, project manager – decided to diversify the activity of the estate and started planting 10 hectares of vineyard, on a slope facing north in order to protect the vines from the torrid sun of Mértola, with the red varieties Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Alicante Bouschet and Syrah, and the white Antão Vaz, Verdelho and Arinto.
When in 2012, with the first wine – another of Paulo Alho's personal tastes – he was faced with the impediment of using the name of the estate as a brand because it referred to a sub-region of Alentejo, Évora.
After several discussions without results, Paulo's wife vented, "it's been so complicated to come up with the name... it's been a discord!". Finally, discord becomes concord and the name Discord becomes the brand of Herdade Vale d’Évora wines.
From the debut harvest, in 2012, which served as a test, some of these bottles are saved for special occasions.
In 2016, partner Vitor Pereira, born in Vila Nova de Famalicão, civil engineer, manager and also a hunter and longtime friend of Paulo Alho, joined the project.
And the Discordia wines are the result of a balance based on the challenges posed by one of the hottest areas of the country, where there is a commitment to the resilience of the vines, tight production control (4.5 tons per hectare) and cultural processes, such as fertilization. organic, vegetable covering and good protection of the fruit. The harvest is also decisive, the dates of the harvest, in which the harvest window is very short and you have to decide from one day to the next. They have to be very quick in the decision. Basically, it is the place that gives personality to the wines.
And in this decade of life, the wines are showing an authenticity without excesses, but with unusual balances, contrary to what was anticipated by the conditions of these lands. The whites surprised by the precise clean fruit, and by the lushness that give great pleasure and that evolve well. The reds have a very particular robustness, they are wines of some heat, they could only be, but they are anything but heavy or boring.
They want Discordia to be wines without rules and with some irreverence. The extreme condition of Mértola means that when going to the maximum exponent, there is no room for many varieties. When they want to highlight something, certain grape varieties stand out, which has led to the emergence of several monovariety wines, such as the top of the range Grande Discórdia wines, which are made from a single grape variety.
