Our 6 -DAYS/5 NIGHTS PREMIUM WINE TOUR is a private and all inclusive tour, offering an in-depth experience into Mendoza, it´s culture, history and of course it´s great wine.  

 

Day 1: Arrival-City Tour & Reserve Tasting

Your host meets you at the Airport and transfers you to the Park Hyatt Hotel hotel. After checking-in your host will take and join you for lunch in Mi Tierra, a wine-theme restaurant owned by three of the most prestigious wineries. Here you are able to discuss the itinerary together and have any queries answered. Following lunch we take a stroll through the small city centre parks and then after a fifteen minute ride we will arrive in Mendoza´s main San Martin Park, 1,000 acres, 50,000 trees, a lake, which we will walk around and on to one of the worlds most impressive statues, Cerro de la Gloria, where you can look down on the city. After that, a stop for a coffee and then back to the hotel, where you will have a couple of hours to relax, before your host meets you again at 19.30 for a special Reserve wine tasting in one of Mendoza´s most prestigous wine bars. 

Hotel: Park Hyatt

Meals:Lunch
 

Day 2: Wine Tour - Lújan de Cuyo

Your host picks you up from your hotel at 8.30am to visit three of our best wineries in the country. This region is considered to be the very home of Malbec, particularly the sub-regions of Agrelo and Perdriel, where the cost of land equates to the quality of the grapes. These two sub-regions epitomise “Terroir” made for the Malbec grape.They are about a thirty minute drive from the city centre, with a view of the majestic Andes mountains all the way. Our first visit will be to winery ALTA VISTA, a one hundred plus year old winery, started by a Spanish family, but now owned by a very progressive French family who have vineyards in France and Hungary as well as being involved in the interesting Clos De Siete project in Uco valley. The winery makes several different wines, but specialize in Malbec. They bottle three premium Single vineyard Malbecs, all scoring high points in the Wine Spectator. After a tour of the winery we will taste three wines, including their excellent Torrontés...a gold medal winner, finishing with one of the Single Vineyard Malbecs. We move on with a twenty minute drive to winery ACHAVAL FERRER, a very new winery, but the first Argentinian winery to obtain 96 points in the Spectator. This project is the idea and commitment of three young men, two from Cordoba and one from Italy. Little they do could be described as conventional, but the operation has style and passion and it is in every bottle, which is why this talented trio have five wines at 92, or more points. It will be the absolute highlight of your day. A short talk about vine management is followed by a tour of the winery and then a fascinating barrel and bottle tasting in the cellar, an experience you will not easily forget. Another twenty minute drive and we will reach winery CARLOS PULENTA, again a new and very stylish winery, lots of local wood and stone blended into a very impressive building. Great winemakers and very interesting cellars. After a tour of the winery we will lunch in  LA BOURGOGNE  restaurant, most deservedly described as “The best winery restaurant in the world”. With an exceptionally good lunch we will drink the wines of the winery, including their Corte B. We should get back to your hotel by 4.30pm.
 

Day 3: Wine Tour - Valle de Uco

Check-out Park Hyatt.

Your host will pick you up from your hotel at 8.30am for a ninety minute drive down to this relatively new and very exciting valley, where great grapes, walnuts and various fruits grow in abundance. A totally different climate (sometimes difficult), varying elevations, even in the same vineyard and abundant sweet water provide winemakers with some of the best “terroir” they could wish for. Many of the oldest, together with the most modern and progressive wineries based up in the Lujan and Maipu regions have also planted vineyards in this valley simply because of the quality of its´ grapes. Our first visit will be to winery O.FOURNIER a stunning, space-age and all gravity operation, Spanish owned and leaders in Tempranillo, with other grapes blended in. Conical tanks, a launch-pad roof, “vaso” trellising, a huge deep underground cellar big enough to double as a movie-set all make this winery an absolute “must see” visit. After a tour we will taste their Urban, B Crux and the top A Crux. A one hour drive will bring us to winery ANDELUNA, a joint venture, modern winery owned by the Ricardo Reina Rutini family (ex Rutini winery) and Herman Ward Lay of snack food fame. As well as being an architecturally pleasing building, it has one of the most harmonious and congenial visitor centres in the country, with beautiful views over the vines, and the Andes as a back-drop. Great photograph opportunity here, particularly when the vines are “fully dressed”. After a tour of the winery we all “sit at the bar” (we show the ladies how to do it!) and taste four wines, including two from the reserve line. This fine winery just won the Decanter Magazine unique Grand Trophy award for their Cabernet Franc Limited Edition 2003, in addition to a Gold Medal for their superb Pasionado Grand Reserve 2003, a great and well deserved brace of wins. From here we have a fifteen minute drive to boutique winery ALTUS, a small, very rural winery that hosts a top quality restaurant BISTRO LA TUPIÑA, set in a very cleverly converted vineyard workers cottage. One of Mendoza´s most talented young chefs will give us a lunch to remember, keeping the glasses well and truly topped-up. Transfer to Club Tapiz

Your host will pick you up at 08.30 to start the very scenic drive up to Aconcagua Park, most of the route running parallel with both the Rio Mendoza (the rafting river) and the famous narrow gauge Trans-Andean railway that used to connect Chile and Argentina. The route is known as The Seven Tunnels. On the way we will stop at the one and only village ( Uspallata - after which the very picturesque Valley is named) for a coffee break, before the final drive up to the park, which is at an altitude of 9,300 feet and just ten miles from the frontier with Chile. Here we will leave the vehicle and walk for an hour in what is best described as “bracing air”, with a good view (cloud cover permitting) of the highest mountain peak outside the Himalayas, Aconcagua towering 13,000 feet above us. If we are lucky we might see some of the famous (and evil looking) Condors flying overhead...keep your cameras loaded and ready. The birds won´t wait for us!! Next we take a very short ride down to the Puente de Inca, one of the worlds` unique natural phenomenona where we can also shop  at the very artisan open-air bazaar. Into the vehicle again for an eighty minute drive back down the mountain to Uspallata once again, where we will stop for a very rustic, tasty “Parrillada” (Bar-B-Que), with the odd glass, or two of wine. Both the journey up and down visually highlight what the ice-age left behind and what regularly occurring earthquakes have done since. If you are a geology fan you will be in your element here. After lunch we will have a twenty minute ride to Seven Colours Rock, another “one-off” that deifies explanation. From there a ninety minute ride, downhill all the way, until we reach  Club Tapiz at 7pm.

   

Your host picks you from your hotel at 9.30am for a twenty minute drive to the fringe of the Maipu region. This is the part of Mendoza where most of the early immigrants were settled, some arriving as far back as 1878 and it is here that their parcel of free land was located. Many of these new and welcome arrivals were from Italy. Consequently Maipu boasts as many Olive trees as vines. They even boast their own annual Olive Queen festival. Our first visit will be to winery  NAVARRO CORREAS a modern winery, owned by the large and very influential drinks group Diageo. One of the few wineries that operates the system of paying per hectare, not per kilo with their “partner” suppliers. A forty five step descent takes us down into the cellar, with a 5,500 barrel capacity...and a long climb back up (works up the appetite) to the visitor centre, where we will taste three wines, including two Alegoria Grand Reserve. A thirty minute drive will take us to TEMPUS ALBA, totally run by a family with a long tradition in the wine business. The winery is modern, compact and very attractive. A major strength of this family is the patience and commitment they have put in to to experimenting and finding the “right” Malbec clone for each of their very different “Terroirs”. The micropropogation takes place in the winery´s own in-vitro laboratory and you will see baby vines being developed in their entrance hall We will taste four wines on their second floor patio, overlooking the vineyards. A short drive will take us to ALMACEN DEL SUR, arguably Mendoza´s best restaurant, set in the middle of a market garden. This company grows their own vegetables, fruits and herbs, (many of which will be included in our lunch), processes and bottles them on-site, which we will see. Amongst their client list is HARRODS, of which they are rightly very proud. We will have a lunch “par excellence” there and then aim to have you back into your hotel by 4.30pm.

Your host transfers you to the airport/terminal. End of tour.

Hotel: N/A

Meals:Breakfast

 

Tour includes
Private transport from your hotel in first class Mercedes vehicle.
Professional, bilingual wine host.
Daily itineraries.
Visits and tastings at seven premium wineries.
Lunches with wine.
Bottled mineral water for the journey

Five nights accommodation
Welcome Pack (includes a bottle of our favourite wine!)