Petersontravels

On the first full day of our Tuscan wine tour we had one winery to visit.  I initially thought one winery wasn’t going to be enough for us, but Fattoria La Pupille proved me wrong!

Our driver Max drove about an hour north from our first hotel to get to the winery, which sits in about the middle of the Maremma wine region of Tuscany.  I’ll admit, I had not even heard of this region until now.

Bonus points that they are thinking about man’s best friend!

The tasting room was all set for us.

I like that they were chilling the red wines to perfection!

I’ve never seen a wine thermometer like this one.  Of course it’s in Celsius, so its all Greek to me!

Before we started the tasting we took a tour of the gardens in front of the winery, which are absolutely stunning!

This was an extensive tour!  Our host Diletta was very informative of the history of the winery.  At only 24 years old she has an impressive knowledge of her family’s winery and the Maremma region!

The winery uses these larger barrels for aging, and they are used for multiple years so the purpose isn’t to impart flavors from the oak.  They also use these interesting looking amphora to give the wine some mineral characteristics.

Including one huge stone tank in the back of another fermentation room.  For what appeared to be a small winery they have pretty much state of the art equipment!

We finally got around to tasting the wine!  Pretty damn good across the board, and William is able to get the wine via his import connections at better prices than they quoted.

Here is the full lineup of most of the wines we opened.  There was at least one more wine that Didi opened when we were eating appetizers on their patio.

I didn’t take any photos of the food prepared by their private chef, but suffice it to say we left completely full!  The entire tour and tasting was 4 and a half hours, an absolute record for us!  When our host Filippo is involved, it seems everybody goes the extra mile!

Our driver Max drove another hour north to our next accommodation,  Poggio An Santi, set upon a hill overlooking the ocean!  We arrived right at sunset!

This is the view from William and Myra’s private deck.  That’s the Italian island of Elba in the background.

As well as your hosts from the same deck.  Our deck was quite similar.  A beautiful spot, that was unfortunately adjacent to what turned out to be a boar hunting scene each morning starting at 0700, that initially sounded like an Italian Civil War!  We couldn’t see the hunters, but they were blasting away below us like it was a video game!

Up next we visit a very wealthy dudes pet project, who built his bragging rights winery inside of an actual quarry, which was a feast for the eyes, but unfortunately not for the pallette.

 

 

 

When I started planning this trip I originally looked to focus on Southern Italy, but after much discussion with my travel agent, Fran Wilder, we decided to start north of Rome in the Tuscany wine region, and include Florence, which I missed out on visiting during out 2007 cruise.  We have been using Fran for assistance with travels for awhile now, and I have to say of all the travel agents we have run across she has been by FAR the best, getting us countless discount on cruises and hotels!  If you are in need of an agent then by all means contact her.  There are no hidden fees or charges, just pure satisfaction.  She works for All Cruise Travel and can be reached at Fran@insidersview.com

Fran put me in touch with Filippo Magnani, who is an expert in Italian wine with an emphasis on Tuscany.  His company set up our week long Tuscany tour that we are currently on.

Our flight from SFO to Rome was likely the most uneventful flight we have ever taken, from the nearly empty SFO airport to the nearly flawless arrival and departure experiences.  After waking up over France, I was able to get a shot out the window of 15,772′ high Mont Blanc among the French Alps.

If you ever take an Italian cruise and it mentions they stop in “Rome”, this is where they actually stop, Civitavecchia, an industrial harbor an hours train ride from Rome.

Upon completing Customs we found our driver Max was waiting for us just outside the exit, as were William and Myra!  He loaded us up into his van and we headed nearly 2 hours north to a small hotel, Villa Acquaviva Wine Resort, in the Maremma wine region of Tuscany.  A beautiful spot just outside of the hilltop town of Manciano.

We were able to get Fabrizio, one of the owners, to pour us a bunch of his wines for our first tasting of the trip.

As it neared sunset we walked around the property with a glass to take in the views.

There were several very friendly cats on the grounds!

The cats were fighting for our attention!

The resorts pool looked inviting, but it was way too cold this time of year.

Here is the view of Manciano over the vineyard as the sun was setting.

I think Fabrizio opened a lot more wines than he expected to!

Up next we travel further north to another winery in the Maremma region, Fattoria Le Pupille, for what has to be the longest wine tasting we have ever experienced!