It is not by chance that we, Bulgarians, tell a story about the origins of
our lands.
When God created the world, He had completely forgotten about Bulgaria. So
the only thing He could do then was to shake out over these lands what was left
of the contents of his already empty sack. Thus, although completely forgotten
at first, we were then generously bestowed a fascinating diversity of spectacular
scenery - plains and valleys huddled between mountain ridges, rivers with lush
flat banks, hills sloping down to the sea coast, and wonderful vines which found
in these lands the unique conditions to thrive and yield light-bodied, deep-flavoured
grapes of superb quality.
Bulgaria has moderate climate with a warm summer and a relatively cold winter.
The mean annual precipitation ranges between about 18" (450 millimetres) in
the northeast and over 47" inches in the high mountains. The average total temperature
required for the growth of grapevines ranges between 3,500°C and 3,700°C. The
soils are diverse and varied - there are acidic (cinnamonic) soils, grey forest
soils, rich zonal humus and carbonate soils, fertile black-earth soils (known
as chernozems), alluvial and mountain meadow soils, including both deep and
shallow sandy soils, and others. They are all exceptionally favourable for vine
growing, the proper ripening of grapes, and the production of quality white
and red wines.
According to the soil and the climatic conditions as well as the grape varieties,
five major vine and wine regions can be defined in the country:
