There is something about wine tasting that is just so relaxing. Hmmm, wonder what it is? Better than going wine tasting at home, is wine tasting around the world. We have done some fabulous wine tasting with family and friends. Wine tasting in Africa, Mexico, and Portugal are 3 of our favorites.

Wine Tasting in Africa

I think wine tasting in Africa with great friends was probably the most unique wine tasting experiences we have ever had. We like taking tours so we can all enjoy without worrying about a designated driver. Our wine tasting tour in Africa had some really unusual twists that made this tour over the top fun.

How does petting cheetahs sound paired with your wine tasting?? I know! Is it possible to have that much fun?

We toured another winery with goats for their mascot. Here we tasted delicious wines including an insane white dessert wine which we took back with us along with some dessert cheese to enjoy back at our hotel in Cape Town

After several wine tastings, we decided to try something a bit different. A winery, that featured olive oil tasting.

Wine Tasting in Mexico

This was a great trip! Our daughter and our son in law took as took Mexico for our 40th anniversary. We love hanging out with our family.

Mexico has some beautiful wine country located inland a bit between Rosarito Beach and Ensenada. There are plenty of wineries to make for a full, slow, relaxing day. Be sure to take the tour into the wine cellars to cool off if you are there in the summer.

One of the things that made this wine country tour even more special was that 3 of our grandchildren are fluent in Spanish. While they couldn’t really do the wine tasting, they did translate everything that was said about each wine by our waiter who had been requested to only speak to them in Spanish. Even the youngest did a great job of translating at just 8.

It was such a fun day, finished off with a fabulous sunset dinner in a lovely vineyard on a warm night.

Wine Tasting in Portugal

Our most recent wine tasting was with our son in Porto, Portugal, a region famous for Port wine. I don’t know that I had ever tasted Port wine before this, but it was good. Port wine is extremely sweet, with a variety of whites all the way to deep reds.

We toured the Calem wine cellar, just across the water from Porto. Easy walk, to our AirBnb so we were able to enjoy ourselves without the worry of getting back to our home base.

Wine Tasting Close to Home

There are some great wineries right here in our home state of California. Napa is renowned for its wineries. Other parts of northern California also have wineries. We did an interesting wine tasting near Shasta. It was a small winery located near a large brush fire. While they didn’t sustain any physical damage to structures, their grapes sustained significant smoke damage. Grapes still on the vine and even wine in wood barrels & the barrels themselves were ruined.

Temecula in Southern California has become a very popular wine tasting destination. My favorite is Leoness. They have the best white merlot I have ever tasted. Great summer wine.