Port, contrary to popular belief in the New World, may only come from the upper Douro Valley in northern Portugal and in the past subsequently shipped from Vila Nova de Gaia, though the latter condition ceased in the mid 1980s. It has been a largely British dominated trade for centuries with most of the old British owned shippers now consolidated into two groups. There are two main styles of Port and within them a myriad of sub classifications and alternatives, but essentially the wood aged or bottle aged wines are the distinct groups. Wood ports do all their aging in cask and having been filtered and bottled are ready to drink. Ruby ports usually have a much shorter period in cask and want maturing in bottle, up to fifty or sixty years. (CW 23/01/12)