Valtuille de Abajo is a small village located in the province of León, just southwest of the geographic center of the Bierzo appellation. Despite its small size and tucked-away location off a small rural route, the village is one of the most culturally significant winemaking sites in all of Spain. Valtuille is home to eighty-five people, fifteen wineries and close to 400 hectares of centenary plantations. Its most famous son is undoubtedly Raúl Pérez, whose worldwide fame as a vintner and wine world personality has shone a spotlight on the village and the region as a whole. While vine-growing and winemaking in this region go back at least 2,000 years to Roman times, it was the Pérez family who were the first to bottle and commercialize their own wine. Following the example they set as early as the 1950s, many of the other families in Valtuille and surrounding villages have abandoned the gererations-long practice of selling grapes to the cooperatives, opting instead to produce and sell their own wine. These days, it is a point of immense pride for the people of Valtuille that not a single kilo of grapes harvested in the village is sold to a cooperative.

Members of the García lineage have been farming grapes in Valtuille de Abajo for at least 300 years. They've probably been at it for quite a bit longer than that, but their oldest surviving documents only date back to the early 18th century. In 1999, Dimas García and Isabel Alba started Vinos Valtuille, the winery that is now run by their daughter, Elena, and son, Marcos, who is known affectionately as "Polo". They farm 16 hectares of vines spread over 110 distinct parcels, the majority of which are in Valtuille. Apart from a couple small parcels of Godello which were planted in the 1990s, the plantations all pre-date the Spanish Civil War, which started in 1936. Some sites were planted as far back as the 1890s.

As a small import company working with small producers, we form very close relationships with our partner viticultores. In this case, that relationship is particularly special. Our company is named San Pelayo Imports after the patron saint of Valtuille de Abajo, a testament to our love for the place and its people. It is one of the privileges of our lives to have been adopted as honorary children of the village, and it brings us great joy to be among the lucky few who get to bring its wines and stories to a wider audience.