Retreat · 12-17 May 2027
Douro Valley, Portugal
From €3,450 per person · 8 guests · all meals · 8 places remaining
The week
The Douro is the oldest demarcated wine region in the world, and still one of the least crowded.
Our base is a family quinta above Pinhão: nine rooms, a terrace over the river, and a cook who has been feeding harvest crews for thirty years. Mornings are for the vineyards, afternoons for the cellars, evenings for the table. Nothing is rushed and nothing is compulsory; if you’d rather read on the terrace than climb another terrace, that’s a perfectly good day too.
Day by day
Arrive, and a bottle on the terrace
Transfers from Porto, rooms, and a first dinner on the terrace to work out who everyone is.
Up the hill, into the schist
Walking the old terraces with the grower, tasting from tank, and lunch cooked over vine cuttings.
Downriver by boat
Two quintas reachable only from the water, and a vertical tasting of ports going back to 1963.
Hands in the lagar
A morning of blending with the winemaker, then the local market and a cooking lesson before dinner.
A free morning, a long last supper
Sleep in or swim, then a farewell dinner in the cellar with the family who own it.
Home, heavier by a case
Breakfast, shipping arranged for anything you’ve bought, and transfers back to Porto.
Included
- Five nights at the quinta, private room
- All meals, and all wine at the table
- Every winery visit, tasting and boat
- Airport transfers from Porto
- Me, for the whole week
Not included
- Flights to Porto
- Travel insurance (required)
- Wine you buy to take home
- Single-supplement rooms, on request