The Cine Club de Jerez and its president, Jose Luis Jimenez,
have been assisting the BBC in a new television programme, part of Michael
Portillo’s new series on train journeys; Great Continental Railway journeys. Jose Luis has given them access to the oldest
existing cine films, from the 1920’s, of the “Wine Train”, which took butts of
wine to be loaded onto ships for export. Last May a television crew led by
Michael Portillo, who is of Spanish descent, came to Jerez to record backgrounds
and interviews. The purpose is to highlight the importance of Jerez in the
development of the railways, as the wine needed to be transported quickly and
efficiently. The film will also explain how the train – or “maquinilla” as it
was known – functioned. It plied the
urban lines with butts of Sherry from the main bodegas down to the quayside at
the Trocadero in Puerto Real. This was the first line in Andalucia – and one of
the first in Spain, and was still in use till the mid 1960’s.
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| From Vizetelly, 1875 |
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| "La Maquinilla" (JL Jimenez) |
Construction of Chiclana’s new Museum of Wine & Salt
will start in early September. The work is part of an on-going project by the
town council to revitalise the town centre, and the location of the new museum
is an old bodega in the Calle Concepcion at the central Plaza de las Bodegas.
It is hoped that the work will be completed in four months, and that the museum
will represent not only a reminder to the locals of their history, but a
valuable tourist destination. Chiclana was once endowed with extensive salt pans, most of which are now lost.
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| The old bodega which will become the new Museum of Wine & Salt |
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