Wine and Culture Tour - Portugal

Portugal offers to the traveller old world charm, wonderful wine country accommodation and beautiful, unspoiled scenery.

For food and wine lovers, Portugal is famous for its Port wine industry, from the North to the South, the country is wealthy in good wines and, apart from the unique Port and Madeira, there are more than one hundred different varieties of wines, ranging from table wines to special ones, all of them reflecting the individual character of their respective soil.

Northeast of the city of Lisbon, you find the Alentejo wine region. The Alentejo is a romantic, hilly region full of cork forests, castles and wineries.
A Wine & Culture tour includes winery visits with the owners and winemakers, vineyard walks, visit to the vines, participating in the harvest with the locals, and obviously wine tasting of exceptional and rare brands!

The Portuguese Gastronomy is rich and varied; we have introduced coriander, pepper, ginger, curry, saffron and paprika in Europe. Thanks to the expansion of the overseas empire, we have been the first European to dock in the Mollucas, in China, in Japan and in Ethiopia. We brought back with us many other exotic products up to then unknown to Europe, such as rice and tea from the Orient, coffee and peanuts from Africa, and, of course, pineapples, peppers, tomatoes and potatoes from the New World.

Apart from the rich recipies we also have our famous cheese,the creamy little cheeses of Azeitão, especially popular in the spring. And rejoice in flavouring the "Serpa" from the Alentejo, sweet and unctuous when it is fresh, and stronger and dryer after one or two years of aging in a cool environment

The Portuguese Wine, the first contact with wine was when the Phoenicians entered the southern part of the country around 600 B.C. They brought varieties with them that become so well established that many have survive for 2.500 years and are grown elsewhere. When the Romans invaded in 219 B.C. their activities extended as far north as the Douro River Valley, site of the present-day Port Wine Region. Roman artefacts can still be found there, including stone vats for crushing grapes by foot and large clay amphoras for fermentation and storage. Portugal was established as an independent nation in 1143. Extensive records of wine production and exports are available since the kings collected taxes on all wines produced, and duties on wines shipped abroad.

The most famous vineyards of the Alentejo region are those of Borba. Reguengos de Monsaraz, Vidigueira, Cuba and Alvito. In the beautiful hillsides and under the hot sun of Alentejo, the wine is produced from the "Periquita", "Trincadeira" and "Aragones" grape sorts. This wine is of good body, smooth, aromatic and garnet-red coloured.