Wine lovers on Wednesday popped the corks of two vintage bottles of champagne rescued from the bottom of the Baltic Sea where they had lain for 200 years.
Noses wrinkled as champagne experts and journalists put their lips to the glasses and gently sipped the centuries-old Veuve Clicquot and Juglar.
World expert Richard Juhlin sampled some of both before sighing and praising the bubbly’s “intense aroma”.
Reporters invited to the event in Mariehamn had rather different impressions.
While one called the Juglar “deep and rich with notes of orange and raisin” and the Veuve “lighter and more floral,” another reporter said the flavors were more like yeast and honey with a touch of…manure.
Believed to be the world’s oldest champagne, the bottles were found lodged in a two-masted schooner that had run aground sometime between 1825 and 1830, said museum official Viveka Loendal.
Veuve Clicquot said that after years of lying underwater, the bottles no longer had labels, but were identified by the branding of the corks.
A total of 168 bottles were raised from the shipwreck near the Aland islands, lodged between Sweden and Finland. Divers discovered the ship in July.
The local Aland government plans to auction off some of the bottles.
Some information in this story was provided by AP, AFP and Bloomberg.
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