Wine Tours

The Langhe's Regal Reds and Gavi's Classic White

Tour Overview

Two distinctive regions of Piedmont rolled into one tour: the Langhe hills, home to Barolo & Barbaresco, and the white-wine region of Gavi.

Private sit-down tastings at the Marchesi di Barolo, Silvio Grasso, Giacomo Bologna, Villa Sparina & more.

Kick off truffle season with an exuberate medieval festival and crazy-funny Palio degli Asini (donkey race) in Alba (October only)

Feast on artisan cheese and salumi during a buffet lunch at a cheese farm in the Alte Langhe.

Hunt for truffles in a hazelnut grove with a truffle hunter and his dog.

Enjoy a hands-on cooking lesson at the company owners’ medieval townhouse near Gavi and catch a peek at village life.

If you love wine, Piedmont is a must-see destination. While first-time visitors to Italy often head to Tuscany, Piedmont is tops among wine cognoscenti, and it’s easy to see why.

First, there’s Piedmont’s stunning variety of wine, from regal Barolo and Barbaresco, to rustic Pelaverga and Freisa, to refreshing whites like classic Gavi and newcomer Arneis.

Then, there’s the food: elegant northern Italian cuisine like porcini risotti, creamy pasta with showers of white truffles, handmade meat-filled ravioli, beef braised in wine, and chocolate-hazelnut desserts.

All this comes packaged in a landscape of breathtaking beauty. In the Langhe, every hill is crowned with a medieval fortress or stately castle. And nowhere can you find such contorted hills so neatly pinstriped with vines. Charming wine villages like La Morra and Gavi are still populated by locals, not tourists, so you’ll get a true peak at Italian wine culture.

The first half of LAND OF BAROLO takes place in the Langhe, the hills south of the Tanaro river. From our base in Alba, the Langhe’s red-wine capital, we’ll venture into Barolo territory for two days and Barbaresco for one. Here we’ll hear the fascinating history of these wines, intertwined with kings, prime ministers, and marchesi, and come to appreciate these most coveted of Italian wines.

Mid-week we transfer to southeast Piedmont, home of Gavi di Gavi wine. Here you’ll stay at a winery: Villa Sparina has turned its old agricultural buildings into an elegant 4-star hotel overlooking the vineyards. A highlight of the tour is a visit to our home in the village of Varinella (pop. 252), one hill away from Gavi. In our medieval townhouse, once owned by the great-grandmother of company cofounder Claudio Bisio, you’ll have a cooking lesson and raid our cellar for some aged Piedmont wines.

Being a native of Gavi, Claudio knows Piedmont from the inside out. What’s more, we’ve spent a decade refining LAND OF BAROLO, one of the company’s first tours. So over the years, we’ve come to know the winemakers like family. And indeed, most of Piedmont’s wineries are small, family-run operations, so our tastings are always intimate, familial, and fun.

This is truly a gourmet taste of la dolce vita!

Dates & fees:

6 days

2012 dates
October 7–12

Price
$3,095
Click here for Early Bird Discounts
Single supplement: $350

Meet
Tortona train station, near Milan

Depart
Arquata Scrivia

What's included:

• 5 nights accommodations (double room) in two 4-star hotels, with breakfast buffet
• 4 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• 3 lunches: welcome lunch, cheese farm, cooking lesson
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Admission to Alba's Palio and Castle of Grinzane Cavour
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described

What's not included:

• Air travel
• Train to meeting point (Tortona train station)
• 1 dinner on your own and 2 lunches
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included

Barolo and the Salone del Gusto in Turin

Tour Overview:

Commune with artisan farmers at Slow Food’s biannual food festival, Salone del Gusto in Turin.

Private sit-down tastings at Ceretto & Conterno Fantino (Barolo) and Manicardi & Vittorio Graziano (Lambrusco).

Accompany a truffle hunter and his dog in the woods.

Feast on artisan cheese and salumi during a buffet lunch at a cheese farm in the Alte Langhe.

Enjoy private tastings at top Barolo & Barbaresco wineries.

Piedmont was the birthplace of the Slow Food movement. As the story goes, Carlo Petrini, a food journalist from the town of Bra in Piedmont, was traveling to Rome in 1986. He was appalled to see that McDonald’s was about to launch its first outlet in Italy—on the famed Spanish Steps, no less. To resist this infiltration of fast food, he launched a countermovement, Slow Food, with the snail as its rebellious emblem. In 1989, the founding manifesto was signed in Paris by 15 countries. Today there are 132 countries with 800 chapters (including, no doubt, one near you!). Among its goals, Slow Food promotes biodiversity (via seed banks of heirloom varieties), the preservation of local food traditions, and small-scale processing, while educating about the hazards of monoculture, genetic engineering, and pesticides.

Every two years, Slow Food holds its huge food festival, the Salone del Gusto, in Turin. This five-day event brings together Slow Food farmers, activists, and consumers for tastings galore and educational panels of every kind. You’ll find Meet the Maker sessions and Taste Workshops on amphora-aged wines, Icelandic preserved foods, Basque cured meat, fruit beer, biodynamic wine, vertical tastings, and dozens of other arcane, intriguing topics. We’ll devote an entire day to the food fair, offering free time to pursue your own interests, then reconvening in late afternoon at the enoteca for a giro d’italia wine tasting.

Slow Food devotees can return to the fair during our second day in Turin, while the rest take a walking tour. Long the capital of the Kingdom of Piedmont, Turin was the royal headquarters of the Savoia family and its court. This gives the city its regal opulence—in its noble palaces, gracious colonnades, and luxe cafés, where aristocrats and political leaders would satisfy their sweet tooth with hot chocolate concoctions.

Preceding our stay in Turin, however, we enjoy time in Piedmont’s wine country. Over the course of three days, you’ll hear the history of Barolo and Barbaresco and how it’s closely tied with 19th century rulers and aristocrats (thus the moniker “Barolo is the king of wines and the wine of kings”). You’ll visit their petite towns of origin. You’ll learn to recognize their differences in the glass. And you’ll taste under the guidance of the winemakers or family members, who will offer Italian-style hospitality and personal anecdotes about life in the Barolo wine world.

When in the countryside, we’ll also partake in food excursions. We’ll head to Murrazano, a DOP cheese town in the Alte Langhe, and visit a family-run cheese and salumi farm. Here we’ll lunch on fresh cow’s, goat’s, and sheep’s cheese made by the daughter and freshly cured salumi made by the mamma. Another morning, we’ll accompany a truffle hunter (trifolau) and his dog into the hazelnut groves to search for these precious tubers, worth their weight in gold.

Every night, we’ll dine like Savoian kings on Piedmont’s famously refined cuisine. One restaurant is a Slow Food affiliate, and two others are owned by wineries: Brezza in Barolo, and the Ceretto-owned La Piola in Alba.

SLOW FOOD FESTA, which in 2009 was a National Geographic Traveler “Tour of a Lifetime,” is on our calendar every other year, coinciding with the biannual Salone del Gusto. It alternates with SLOW FOOD, COMFORT FOOD, which visits Piedmont and Parma during the truffle season.

Chianti, Brunello & Vino Nobile

Tour Overview:

Visit three historic wine zones: Chianti Classico in central Tuscany, and Montalcino and Montepulciano in southern Tuscany.

Private sit-down tastings at Castello di Brolio, Castello dei Rampola, Ciacci Piccolomini d’Aragona, Icario & more.

Listen to Benedictine monks sing plainchant in Sant’ Antimo Abbey.

Explore the Gothic city of Siena and its art treasures.

Taste pecorino cheese in the Renaissance town of Pienza.

Roll up your sleeves for a cooking lesson at a Chianti farmhouse.

If you’ve never been in Italy, this tour is for you. When people dream of Italy, it’s Tuscany in their mind’s eye: rolling hills punctuated with slender cypresses, quaint stone farmhouses bordered by lavender and rosemary, tidy vineyards flanking dense forests that seem ready to burst with Renaissance falconers on horseback.

It’s not a fiction. Tuscany’s wine country is situated in some of the most gorgeous, pastoral, and carefully preserved countryside on earth. Here you’ll find wines of equal splendor. Gone are the days of the straw fiasco. Tuscan winemakers are now among the most forward-thinking and iconoclastic of Italian enologists, and today’s Chianti Classico, Brunello di Montalcino, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, and Super Tuscans are powerful, modern expressions that will surprise and delight even the most discerning wine drinkers.

This tour covers two subregions within the ancient heart of Tuscany. We begin in Chianti Classico. Lying between Florence and Siena, this sprawling, forested land was contested by the rival city-states for nearly 400 years, and its fortified towns and storybook castles bespeak a history of warfare. We’ll visit the crenulated castle where Chianti was born and talk with winemakers whose bloodlines and properties go back to the 1100s.

While in Chianti, we’ll also delve into Tuscany’s cucina povera during a cooking lesson in a rustic farmhouse kitchen. Prepare for fun! Even cooking-phobes who only boil water will be merrily whipping out ravioli and tiramisu before the night is over.

The second half of the tour is in southern Tuscany. Barren of trees except for the lone cypresses that dot the brown hills (which inspired the color ‘burnt Siena’), this is far different from forested Chianti. A medieval feeling characterizes Siena, where we’ll have an art day, and Montalcino, our home base, as well as the Romanesque abbey of Sant’ Antimo, where we’ll listen to monks chant in an austere, spiritually resplendent environment. In contrast, the Renaissance architecture of Pienza, an “ideal” city built for Pope Pius II which today is brimming with pecorino cheese, will seem downright modern.

Famous for its red wines since the time of Charlemagne, Montalcino is producing what’s widely considered Tuscany’s top wine: Brunello di Montalcino. Meanwhile, economy-minded wine enthusiasts will appreciate our time in Montepulciano, whose Vino Nobile has found fans as far back as Thomas Jefferson and Voltaire.

Altogether this tour provides an excellent overview of the great historic red-wine zones of Tuscany and their centerpiece grape, sangiovese. With its judicious mix of art, culture, and culinary sidelights, this will truly be your dream vacation!

Dates & fees:

6 days

2012 dates
May 21–26,
June 25–30,
September 3–8

Price
$3,095
Click here for Early Bird Discounts
Single supplement: $350

Meet and Depart
Florence train station [map]

What's included:

• 5 nights accommodations (double room) in two 3-star hotels, with breakfast buffet
• 3 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• 1 hands-on cooking lesson, with dinner & wine included
• 1 welcome lunch
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Admission to Castello di Brolio
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described

What's not included:

• Air travel
• 1 dinner on your own and most lunches
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included

Cycling the Wine Roads of San Gimignano and Chianti Classico

Tour Overview:

Bike in two distinctive regions of Tuscany: Chianti Classico and San Gimaigno.

Enjoy post-ride wine tastings at Castelo Brolio, Vecchie Terre di Montefili, Panizzi, and Cesani.

Refuel with gourmet wine dinners featuring Tuscany’s cucina rustica.

Visit Bocaccio’s birthplace in Certaldo and Gaiole and Radda, both part of the medieval Chianti League.

See Italian Gothic masterpieces of art in San Gimignano and Siena.

This tour covers two subregions within the ancient heart of Tuscany. We begin in Chianti Classico. Lying between Florence and Siena, this sprawling, forested land was contested by the rival city-states for nearly 400 years, and its fortified towns and storybook castles testify to that history of warfare. Here you’ll find crenulated castles, stone farmhouses trellised with roses, country lanes flanked with cypress rows, and hand-built stone walls enclosing ancient olives groves. It’s picture-postcard Chianti, its charming character carefully protected by locals.

The second part is around San Gimignano. This beautifully preserved medieval city was a stop on the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route that lead from Canterbury to Rome, connected by abbeys. In 1348, the city was brought to its knees by the Black Death (bubonic plague) and development ceased, so what remains today is essentially a medieval village frozen in time, its ancients walls, city gates, and numerous towers as they were during the Trecento.

For modern-day cyclists, both areas offer quiet back roads and impeccable landscapes. We’ll follow some designed wine roads and castle roads, cycle through cool forests and open farmland, and see plenty of vineyards. Where there’s vines, there’s hills, so these rides should offer enough challenges to satisfy seasoned bikers.

The sample itinerary for CHIANTI BY BIKE is structured with dual activities in mind. During the first part of the day, we bike. In the later afternoon, we’ll have time to relax and visit the wineries for a private tour and tasting. (We arrive by van, not bike; contrary to some people’s preconceptions, we never bike from winery to winery.) Of course, since this is a customizable tour, we can tailor it to your interests. If you want more miles and less wineries, no problem. Or vice versa. We can add or subtract days or regions, or substitute higher-end or more economical accommodations. Just give us a call to discuss your ideas, budget, and projected dates. All you need is a group of four or more bikers for your dream biking vacation.

Dates & fees:

7 days (flexible)

2012 dates
Tour available for custom groups only, minimum size: 4. Inquire about prospective dates.

Price
$3,695 (based on the accompanying 7-day itinerary; modifications are possible, including the number of days, the level of accommodation, daily mileage on bike, the inclusion of wine tastings, the inclusion of meals)

Single supplement: $400 (for 6 nights)

Bike rental: $300 (for 7 days)

Meet and Depart
Florence train station [map]

What's included:

• 6 nights accommodations (double room) in two 3-star hotels, with breakfast buffet
• 5 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described
• Bike maps/route notes; saddle bag; cage pedals
• SAG wagon support during bike rides

What's not included:

• Air travel
• 1 dinner on your own and all lunches
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Bike and helmet rental (optional)
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included

Biking in Barolo and Gavi Wine Country

Tour Overview:

Bike in three distinctive regions of Piedmont rolled into one tour: the Langhe hills, home to Barolo; Asti, of Asti Spumante fame; and the white-wine region of Gavi.

Enjoy post-ride wine tastings at the Marchesi di Barolo, Marchesi di Gresy, Giacomo Bologna, Villa Sparina and more.

Refuel with gourmet wine dinners featuring Piedmont’s elegant, French-influenced cuisine.

Visit the wine towns of Alba, Asti and Gavi.

Located in view of the Italian Alps, the hills of Piedmont are famous for their wine and truffles. They’re also a biker’s paradise. This is the territory of such cycling legends as Fausto Coppi. It’s an area where, every Sunday, you’ll see pelotons of bikers out for a morning spin…up the mountains. And it’s where you’re likely to find your own bike nirvana.

The PEDAL PIEDMONT sample itinerary combines three subzones of Piedmont, all well known for their wine: There’s Gavi in southeast Piedmont, a wooded landscape crisscrossed by river valleys and limestone hills. There are the gentle slopes around Asti, land of barbera and moscato. And there are the grander Langhe hills south of the Tanaro river, which are home to Barolo and Barbaresco. All offer a magical environment. Everywhere you turn, there’s a hillcrest topped with a stone village, medieval fortress, or regal palace. There are well-groomed vineyards, thick chestnut woods, tidy hazelnut groves, and quaint tiny farms. And the Alps often provide a dramatic backdrop in the distance.

The sample itinerary is structured with dual activities in mind. During the first part of the day, we bike. In the later afternoon, we’ll have time to relax and visit the wineries for a private tour and tasting. (We arrive by van, not bike; contrary to some people’s preconceptions, we never bike from winery to winery.) Of course, since this is a customizable tour, we can tailor it to your interests. If you want more miles and less wineries, no problem. Or vice versa. We can even mix in some hiking in the Langhe. We can add or subtract days or regions, or substitute higher-end or more economical accommodations. Just give us a call to discuss your ideas, budget, and projected dates. All you need is a group of four or more bikers for your dream biking vacation.

Dates & fees:

8 days (flexible)

2012 dates
Tour available for custom groups only, minimum size: 4. Inquire about prospective dates.

Price
$3,895 (based on the accompanying 8-day itinerary; modifications are possible, including the number of days, the level of accommodation, daily mileage on bike, the inclusion of wine tastings, the inclusion of meals)

Single supplement: $450 (for 7 nights)

Bike rental: $330 (for 8 days)

Meet and Depart
Tortona train station, near Milan [map]

What's included:

• 7 nights accommodations (double room) in two 3-star hotels, with breakfast buffet
• 6 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described
• Bike maps/route notes; saddle bag; cage pedals
• SAG wagon support during bike rides

What's not included:

• Air travel
• 1 dinner on your own and all lunches
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Bike and helmet rental (optional)
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included

Discovering Piedmont’s Buried Treasures

Tour Overview:

Taste the pinnacle of Langhe wines in Barolo and Barbaresco.

Enjoy private sit-down tastings at marquee wineries such as Silvio Grasso and Marchesi di Gresy.

Visit Alba’s famed truffle market in full swing.

Feast on artisan cheese and salumi during a buffet lunch at a cheese farm in the Alte Langhe.

Hunt for truffles in a hazelnut grove with a truffle hunter and his dog.

Only have a short amount of time? This mini-tour is just for you, spotlighting the best of the Langhe at harvest-time.

First, there’s the white truffles, worth their weight in gold. October and November are the time when truffles are hunted, sold, and celebrated in Alba, truffle capital of Piedmont. It’s when these subterranean tubers have finished their 50-day growing cycle at the roots of favored trees and been rooted out by the obedient hounds of trifolau (truffle hunters). And it’s the perfect time to delve into the mystique and business of these homely, fragrant funghi.

We’ll accompany a truffle hunter into the woods, seeing where and how truffles grow, watching his truffle hound in action, and hearing how hunters train their endearing, curly haired pooches to find and fetch—but not eat!—their precious cargo.

We’ll also hunt for truffles in Alba. We’ll visit its famous truffle market, now in full swing, where the heady, earthy scent of gathered specimens will make you swoon.

And we’ll look for them on the menu, where they’re typically grated over tajarin (handmade egg linguine), risotto with Castelmagno cheese, ravioli filled with egg and chard, and other creamy, opulent dishes.

Northern Italy’s sub-alpine mountain regions make a huge number of cheeses, some named after their towns, such as Gorgonzola, Castelmagna, and Bra (home to the Slow Food movement). We’ll visit Murrazzano, located in the Alte Langhe and known for its DOP fresh cheese rounds made from cows’ and sheep’s milk. As we climb to this higher-elevation area of the Langhe, vineyards drop from sight and pastures abound. We’ll visit a new family-run caseificio (cheese farm) where we’ll have a tour and a buffet lunch featuring their fresh cheeses and homemade salumi.

Whether it’s mountain cheese or white truffles, there’s nothing better to wash it down than Barolo, that elixir of wines. We’ll visit a family-run winery in Barolo, where a family member will pour Barolos from different single vineyards to demonstrate what a difference terroir makes. Then we’ll repeat the lesson the next day in Barbaresco. Delicious homework required!

Dates & fees:

3 days

2012 dates
October 27–29

Price
$1,695
Single supplement: $175

Meet
Tortona train station, near Milan [map]

Depart
Tortona or Asti

What's included:

• 2 nights accommodations (double room) in a 4-star hotel, with breakfast buffet
• 2 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• 1 buffet lunch at a cheese farm (with wine)
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Admission to Alba’s truffle fair
• Admission to the Castle of Grinzane Cavour
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described

What's not included:

• Air travel
• Train to meeting point (Tortona train station)
• 1 lunch
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included

Amarone, Soave, and Italy’s Northern Renaissance

Tour Overview:

Explore two wine regions: Valpolicella, home of Amarone; and Soave, where a renaissance in quality whites is underway.

Private sit-down tastings at Zenato, Tommasi, Accordini, Pieropan and more.

See Padua and Giotto’s magnificent fresco cycle in the Arena Chapel.

Soak up some history on a walking tour of Verona.

Since antiquity, semi-dried grapes have worked their magic in Valpolicella, the hilly wine zone north of Verona. Today, Amarone prevails as the most luscious modern expression of this ancient style. It is deservedly a cult wine among cognoscenti. But it also has an array of attractive siblings: easy, approachable Valpolicella; complex, hybrid-style Ripasso; and luscious dessert wine Recioto. We’ll learn the differences and see the special steps involved. Far more than Barolo or Brunello, Italy’s other pedigree reds, Amarone is a labor-intensive wine, requiring carefully trimmed bunches to be laid on mats for a four-month drying period (appassimento) in airy fruit lofts, which we’ll visit. In this land of five finger-like valleys, where wind and rain sweep down from the Dolomites, weather matters as much after harvest as before, making things even more challenging for winemakers.

Next door is Soave, a wine region named after the eponymous town. This walled village has an impressive crenellated military castle, once a pawn in the wars between Venice and Milan. But even more impressive is today’s Soave wine. Abandon any preconceptions based on spaghetti wines of old! This is a new day for Soave, shepherded in by a handful of mavericks like Pieropan, who have rigorously pursued quality.

Verona and Padua were very much part of the Northern Italian Renaissance, so art and architecture are integrated into this tour. The highlight is unquestionably Giotto’s fresco cycle in the Arena Chapel in Padua. Painted in 1305 and recently restored, this influential masterpiece laid the groundwork for artists like Masaccio and Michaelangelo. Verona, the provincial capital, offers a wider swath of art history, beginning with its Roman coliseum, a well-preserved specimen that now hosts summer opera. We’ll take a walking tour that points out other remnants of Roman history as we visit the town’s highlights, including Piazza delle Erbe, a market square lined by frescoed palaces, and the balcony of Juliet Capulet, the doomed heroine of Shakespeare's timeless Romeo and Juliet.

Finally, we’ll also take in some of the Veneto’s natural splendor: Lake Garda is the easternmost of Italy’s massive pre-alpine lakes, carved out by retreating glaciers. Here we’ll visit Sirmione, a favorite resort town of Roman patricians, situated on a narrow spit of land. But throughout the tour, we’ll be surrounded by the beauty of the rolling hills and valleys that comprise the Valpolicella zone—called Vallis-polis-cellae in Latin, or “valley of the many cellars.” Some things never change.

Dates & fees:

5 days

2012 dates
June 4–8

Price
$2,895
Click here for Early Bird Discounts
Single supplement: $300

Meet
Venice

Depart
Verona train station

What's included:

• 4 nights accommodations (double room) at Musella Winery & Relais, with breakfast
• 3 gourmet dinners (three courses with wine)
• All wine tastings mentioned
• Admission to Giotto’s Arena Chapel
• Guided walking tour of Verona
• Shuttle at beginning/end of tour, as described

What's not included:

• Air travel
• 1 dinner on your own and all lunches
• After-dinner drinks, or special wines at tastings that are not part of what is provided to the group
• Items of a personal nature
• Anything not specified as included