THE GREAT PORTUGUESE WINE TRIP: DOURO, DÃO & BAIRRADA

Porto → Bairrada → Dão → Douro

☾ 6 Nights

TRIP OVERVIEW

A trip that will take you to three great wine regions in northern Portugal. Innovative changing regions. After a day in Porto go south to Bairrada, the land of the Baga grape. Polymorphic red grape Baga makes fine long-lived red wines as well as Champagne-style blanc de noir sparkling wines. The sparkling wines perhaps surprisingly make an ideal pairing with the local roast suckling pig. Next it’s on to the green hills of the Dão region, sometimes called Portugal’s Burgundy. Small-scale producers, with vineyards at times seemingly emerging from the forest, craft aromatic, subtle reds and whites from (among others) two of Portugal’s rising-star grapes: red Touriga Nacional and white Encruzado. Finally move on to the Douro Valley, the old country of fine Portuguese wine and, of course, Port. Stay at high-luxe winery-hotel Quinta da Vacaria while visiting the best of the best wineries on the riverbanks of the Douro River. You’ll discover the deep dry red and white wines that have come to be the new Douro Valley DOC wines alongside the traditional long-aged Ports.

THE GREAT PORTUGUESE WINE TRIP: DOURO, DÃO & BAIRRADA

Day 1 – Porto Reborn

Get your sea legs in Porto, the riverside city that aged and shipped Port for centuries when the upriver Douro Valley was an undeveloped vine land. Stay at the luxurious The One Monumental Palace in the heart of the city. Your welcome dinner to Portugal will be at Almeja. This elegant Portuguese bistro emerged in a city that’s long prized traditional French-inflected dining and rustic eating-houses but today is an overflowing boiler of creative chefs forging a new Portuguese cuisine in real time, one more tied to the land than that of sister international Lisbon. This might be your first chance to taste really excellent Portuguese wine, so take it.

Day 2 – Sparkling Wine in Bairrada

Down the coast from Porto today, it’s Bairrada time. This is a wine region few outside Portugal know much about, but it demands attention now more than ever. The potential of local red grape Baga has drawn winemaking talent to Bairrada to join the local winemakers who never gave up on their terroir. You’ll visit Luis Pato, the man who has done more for Bairrada’s fame than nearly anyone. Self-proclaimed “Baga rebel” Pato makes fine, subtle wines, most notably a series of impressive single-vineyard Baga reds. Next move on to Rei dos Leitões for an archetypical Bairrada lunch of roast suckling pig and sparkling Bairrada. To the Portuguese, this is what Bairrada is known for: the Champagne-method sparkling blanc de noir wine paired with the rich roast pork. After lunch, travel inland to Dão wine country. Your converted palace hotel, like many a Dão estate, makes wine from local vineyards. Start your stay with a tasting of the wines made at the property. Relax for a dinner in at the farm-to-table restaurant Memórias.

Day 3 – Dão: Green Land and Fine Wine

Today you’ll head to the hill country near the Serra da Estrela Mountains. Green, wet and cool, wooded and dotted with villages and small vineyard plots. This is some of the prime vineyard area of the Dão. After tasting at two mountainside wineries stop for lunch in the wine village of Gouveia where everyone must make at least a little wine. Then back to your palatial hotel in Santar, with its gardens and terraces, and have dinner in.

Day 4 – Dão Terroir and a Taste of Douro

Before making your way to the Douro Valley it’s into the hills of the remote depths of Dão for a tour and tasting at elite estate Taboadella. Old vines, prime terroir and the experience of top Douro producer Quinta Nova make Taboadella a glimpse of Dão’s luxury side. Expect age-worthy reds and whites with stunning complexity. Slip north to the Douro for your welcome lunch with views of the river valley at your feet at Quinta de São Luiz. This venerable estate has a top local chef and more wine and Port than you could possibly try: a fine introduction. Then, hilltop single-estate wine tasting at Quinta das Carvalhas before heading to your oasis winery-hotel Quinta da Vacaria. Dine in at 1 Michelin star Schistó or elegant-relaxed 16 Légoas with wines from the estate.

Day 5 – Port & Douro Traditions

Explore iconic quinta wine estates of Douro, where world-class Port and Douro wines are on the menu. Start at family winery Churchill’s, an artisan Port house started by British-Portuguese wine legend Johnny Graham. At Churchill’s tranquil Quinta da Gricha in the remote upper reaches of the Douro River, you can see the project up close and taste specialty ports as well as Douro reds and whites. Then it’s on to vintage Port specialist Quinta do Noval, whose old-vine Nacional Vintage is among the most sought-after Ports in the world. Taste a selection of vintages from exceptional years or aged Tawnys at the hilltop quinta. For lunch, Quinta do Bomfim’s local-focused restaurant on the Douro River serves elegant dishes accompanied by wines from the Symington portfolio. Symington is known for venerable Port names like Graham’s, Warre’s and Dow’s, and the DOC Douro wines they make are top shelf as well. In the hilly Douro, boats were the only practical way to get around for centuries, and a ride down river yields up-close views of near-vertical vineyards.

Day 6 – Douro Wine Mastery

Your last winery visit in Douro will be an in-depth exploration of the wines that changed the region. Niepoort, under the direction of restless Dirk Niepoort, has transformed itself from a boutique Port specialist into a titan of dry Douro wines. Exceptional reds and whites showing off single vineyards and local grapes are the signature here. You’ll have a true masterclass tasting with an expert from the winery. Expect not only Niepoort’s Douro wines but also Niepoort wines from other parts of Portugal like Bairrada and  Dão, alongside rare library wines impossible to find elsewhere. This is the cutting edge of Portuguese wine. Just down the hill, a fine dining lunch on the water at DOC. Rui Paula (2 Michelin stars at Casa de Chá da Boa Nova) has been redefining Douro cuisine here for years. A tasting menu combining country products with Atlantic fish and seafood is a welcome treat. A terrace inches from the water, one of Douro’s best wine cellars, and even single malts and cigars for an after-lunch treat make DOC a true feast.

Day 7 – Departure

Private transfer to the Porto airport for departure.

WHERE YOU’LL STAY

Hotel Valverde Santar

This luxury countryside getaway sits in the heart of the Dão wine region. Hotel Valverde Santar is a 5-star Relais & Chateaux property in Santar. There is a Michelin recommended restaurant on site, Memórias, as well as casual bar and poolside options for meals and snacks. Cooking classes are available with Chef Luís Almeida, head of the kitchen at Memórias restaurant.

The hotel was a home of the Portuguese royal family, and the common areas still exude that old-world charm. The hotel’s extensive gardens are part of the interconnected restored Santar gardens which are a series of five historic gardens belonging to four families.

All rooms have been tastefully updated to luxury standards, retaining historic charm. There is a spa with treatment rooms, a heated indoor pool, a sauna, Turkish bath and ice fountain. Massages are available by appointment. Private and group yoga and pilates classes are available for a fee. There is also an outdoor pool.

Torel Quinta da Vacaria

Quinta da Vacaria is a 1 Michelin-Key luxury property in the heart of the Douro. The elegantly designed 5-star winery hotel feels in harmony with the landscape and offers stunning views of the Douro River and riverside hills. Even the rooms have their own terraces with views. The hotel is surrounded by vineyards, said to be some of the oldest in the Douro, producing Quinta da Vacaria DOC Douro and Port wines that you can enjoy during your stay.

In a region of hilly winding roads, dining in offers a welcome respite from the curves. Quinta da Vacaria offers three on-site options. 16 Legoas serves modern regional dishes in a relaxed environment; Barbus, the classy bar with views over the Douro River specializing in an extensive Champagne menu and light snacks; and superstar Chef Vitor Matos’s fine dining Shistó, which has a 10-course tasting menu. Chef Matos holds 5 Michelin stars across his restaurants in Porto and Lisbon.

Don’t miss the vinotherapy spa, where you can unwind with the rejuvenating water circuit, a heated indoor pool, sauna, Turkish bath, sensory Vichy showers, treatment rooms, relaxation rooms and a vinotherapy room. You can choose from an extensive menu of massages and spa treatments.

The One Monumental Palace

5-star luxury dead center in the heart of Porto, the One Monumental Palace Hotel offers elegance and good taste in a stately building from 1923. A spa with an elegant indoor swimming pool, a sauna and hammam, a one Michelin star restaurant, a Japanese restaurant and a cocktail bar mean you hardly need to leave the site.

The hotel is on one of Porto’s central streets, Avenida dos Aliados, and is walking distance to iconic sites such as Lello bookshop, Torre dos Clérigos, the Bolhão Market and São Bento Station, not to mention the many nearby bars and restaurants.

WHERE YOU’LL GO

PORTUGAL

Portugal is a nation shaped by the Atlantic. The beaches of the Algarve, Lisbon and Porto’s proximity to the sea and history of trade, wine regions from Setúbal to Vinho Verde, the sea is there. Perhaps the openness of a seafaring nation is what makes Portugal such a great place to visit. Traditions are alive here, and people will be happy to show them to you with pride. The rarified exists as well, but even there chefs are never too busy to talk and winemakers will invite you to eat with the family. Snobbishness is a rarity; the opposite is much more common. Maybe that’s why it’s taken so long for the rest of the world to discover Portugal: they were too humble to tell everyone what amazing treasures they had. Lisbon is a true jewel, with its hills overlooking a sea of red roofs bathed by Atlantic freshness. Porto feels frozen in time, until you see the amazing new hotels, restaurants, and port lodges. And the wine, where to start? If you want to taste some of the best-kept secrets in Europe made from grapes you can neither place nor pronounce, there’s no better place. 

DÃO

Dão is perhaps Portugal’s most exciting wine region at the moment. Surrounded by mountains on three sides and featuring granite soils, this region of northern Portugal has a long history of producing fine red wines. Its potential is only now being realized, as local producers and outside stars experiment with a range of excellent indigenous grapes and a geography of rivers and forests that creates immense variation from one vineyard to another. Red wines blending Portuguese star grape Touriga Nacional, Alfrocheiro, Jaen (Mencía in Spain) and Tinta Roriz (Spain’s Tempranillo) are among the best in Portugal, subtle and aromatic but with great aging potential. The Dão is also home to Encruzado, a white grape quickly gaining fame for its ability to produce deep, complex aged whites when matured in oak. Dão may finally be claiming its position as Portugal’s premier region for unfortified wine production.

THE DOURO RIVER VALLEY

The Douro is easily the most dramatic wine region in the world. And stunningly beautiful. The riverbanks, covered in near-vertical sloping vineyards that look impossible, rise thousands of feet above the Douro River. Whitewashed quintas–winery manor houses– punctuate the hilltops, offering incredible views across the valley. The roads wind their way through the hills, making even short journeys scenic and painfully slow. The Douro is where Port comes from, and Port is perhaps the greatest sweet wine ever produced. It’s also the source of Douro wines, dry wines which 30 years on have staked a claim among the most respected wines in Portugal. It’s a seemingly impossible place to grow grapes and make wine, but today, as in centuries past, the quality of the Douro terroir seems to justify the effort.

PORT & DOURO WINES

The Douro is the source for Portugal’s two most important wines. The first and by far the most storied is Port, the sweet wine that has been made from Douro grapes and aged in Porto for centuries. British wine shippers popularized the wine and named it with a shortened version of the name of the city of Porto. Today, Port remains atop the world of sweet wine, particularly vintage and tawny Ports. Vintage Port is a powerful, sweet fortified red wine that is built to age for decades in bottle before being consumed, while tawny does its aging in large barrels in the cavernous cellars of Vila Nova de Gaia and develops into a golden elixir with the years. Quality examples of both types are some of the best wines in the world and will dispel any preconceptions one might harbor about sweet wines.

Douro wines are a different beast entirely. In the 1990s, a group of producers known as the Douro Boys brought dry wines from the Douro Valley to global attention with their unique and complex bottlings. The same exceptional vineyards that produced the grapes for the best vintage Ports turned out to be exceptional for making powerful red wines that were unlike any other in the world. In the last three decades, Douro reds have become the most interesting and appreciated Portuguese wines on the market. The extreme slopes, varied soils and harsh climate of this valley combine with a wealth of local grape varieties to produce wines that range from fruity and delicious to intense and enormous. Even the whites from the region are becoming better and more diverse every year.

There’s something for everyone in the Douro, an essential stop for every wine traveler.

PORTO

Port country is two places in one connected by the Douro River itself. The city of Porto lies where the river empties into the Atlantic. Built up the steep river banks, Portugal’s second city has a sleepy, forgotten enchantment to it that helps explain its recent renaissance. 

New luxury hotels have sprung up in restored old buildings. The restaurant scene, never as dynamic as Lisbon’s, is looking formidable now. Central Porto is relaxed even in spite of the recent influx of visitors; it’s remarkably easy to lose track of time here. 

When you emerge from the winding streets that lead from the river up to “downtown” Porto you can see across to Vila Nova de Gaia, ground zero for port wine. The most famous sweet wine in the world has been aged in this town for hundreds of years. The British were the shippers, lending their names to the signs that light up the night sky and the bottles that line shop windows: Sandeman, Warre’s, Taylor’s, Graham’s, whose storehouses are filled with barrels black from  decades aging port. Yet if you head out of Porto looking for the vineyards, you’ll have to go way up-river before finding them, to the Douro Valley.

WHAT’S INCLUDED

  • 6 nights hotel, double occupancy, breakfast daily, expert private guides, private tours, premium tastings at wineries, restaurant concierge service and all reservations, private luxury transport

NOT INCLUDED

  • flights to/from Spain or Portugal, gratuities to guides and drivers, extras in hotels, travel insurance (recommended)

EPICUREAN WAYS ADVANTAGE

We pride ourselves on our discerning taste in hotels, a concierge approach to restaurants for you, and our long experience in the world of wine enabling us to select wineries worth visiting and arrange premium tastings at each winery.

You will be accompanied by a driver-guide during your wine touring. Your visits and tastings will be private and with the winemaker, a family member or an expert who knows the winery and the wines well. We work with the wineries to make sure that you taste the best and most representative wines during each visit. It is sometimes possible to arrange extended tastings that include old vintages or rare wines. We have an extensive group of wineries whose owners we know and with whom we work regularly, so we can guarantee high-level visits even if a winery has to be substituted. If you have an interest in visiting a particular producer please let us know.

We include restaurant concierge service as part of your trip. Note that our restaurant suggestions are just that–suggestions. Places we love, places to go back to time after time. We recommend these places after years of experience eating in Spain and Portugal together with frequent research and input from our local partners. We aspire to guide your choices with information on the styles of cuisine and restaurants; the choice on where to eat is yours based on your preferences and desires.

We have extensive experience with hotels ranging from 5-star luxury properties to private boutique hotels. Let us know your preferences and we will tailor the hotel choices for you.

All tours, experiences and hotels are subject to availability and will be confirmed upon booking the trip.

TRIP PRICES

Note that we can customize this trip for you. Add days in your arrival or departure city or in other locations or make changes to the experiences, winery visits, restaurants, or hotels included in the trip. Whatever it is, we’re here to work with you. Once you’re happy with the trip plan and have some idea of your dates we will send you the price.