Most Expensive Champagne From The Ocean Floor

July 24, 2010 - PRLog -- Divers have located what appears to be the globe’s oldest drinkable champagne in a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea. Before they even got back to port, the divers had tasted the bottle they had brought up from 200 feet.

It is estimated that the bottle is part of a cargo destined for the Russian court in the 1780’s. Twenty bottles are considered to be aboard the sunken wreck.

Each bottle could sell for around $68,000 "If the corks are intact and the sparkling drink is genuine and drinkable" says Swedish wine expert, Carl-Jan Granqvist.

In the 1980's a 1787 Bordeaux, Chateau Lafitte, was put up for auction at Christie's for 105, 00 pounds, ($160, 00). When Christopher Forbes, the buyer, cockily exhibited his investment, the ancient cork, which had shrunk, fell into the bottle of what was the most expensive bottle of vinegar. Apparently former owner of the bottle of wine was Thomas Jefferson.

"You wouldn't want to drink it - it is probably quite putrid to taste," said auctioneer Andrew Aldridge, in 2009, when a charred bottle of beer was sold. It had reportedly survived the explosion of the Hindenburg zeppelin, in 1937. It is believed to have been auctioned for between $7,500 and $20,000. A great deal of the original contents had disappeared.

A New Jersey fireman, Leroy Smith supposedly discovered 6 bottles of Lowenbrau and a copper pitcher intact at the crash site. He is reported to have handed five other bottles to his mates.

Wineflyers International, an Australian company, let it be known they had sourced and sold six bottles of wine from the Titanic to “a high profile customer in Asia”, in 2002.

A Swedish freighter Jonkpoing was carrying a full cargo of alcohol ordered by Nicholas II on its way to Russia in 1916, when she was torpedoed by a German. A salvage company reportedly recovered 2000 bottles of 1907 Heidsiek & Co from her wreckage in 1997. The Burgundy and Cognac had not survived 82 years of salt water submersion.

Heidsieck’s Director of Exports, Laurent Davaine said ”The Champagne still shows an amazing balance and a beautiful golden hue with the effervescence still present.” At the close of 2008 almost all of the bottles had been sold, but there were still remained ten bottles at the Ritz Carlton in Moscow, valued at $35,000 each.

The M.V. Republic was a proto-Titanic – the biggest operating deluxe cruise ship of her day, owned by White Star Lines, until she banged into another ship. In 1981divers discovered a 1898 Moet & Chandon that still had “a robust, hearty taste with a pale color similar to ginger ale.” Sadly, after spending $10,000 per day to raise three hundred bottles to the surface, Wine Spectator reported that Christie’s “found no bottles in condition to be auctioned off.” They had all been “invaded by sulfur-producing bacteria that travel at the bottom of the sea,” according to Michael Davis, Vice President of Christie’s wine division.

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