By LAWRENCE TAN
For
approximately US$33,000 per bottle, you can now get your hands on one of 10
bottles of vintage 1907 Heidsieck & Co Monopole Champagne, that have been
ageing gracefully in the depths of the Baltic Sea for the past 82 years, at the
Ritz-Carlton Moscow.
The vintage cases of bubbly were among cargoes of Cognac, Burgundy and Champagne recovered
from a long-lost shipwreck by Swedish divers off the coast of Finland in July
1997.
But
while the Cognac and the Burgundy did not survive the years of being submerged
in the ocean depths, the 2,000 bottles of Heidsieck & Co Monopole Champagne
were remarkably well preserved.
The unfortunate ship in question was a Swedish ketch called
The Jonkoping that was carrying cargo bound for delivery to Tsar Nicolas II in
St. Petersburg, Russia before it was sunk by a German U-22 submarine off the
coast of Finland in the wee hours of a November morning in 1916.
www.ritzcarltonmoscow.ru