Priorat Wine Tours

Priorat Wine Tours

The Priorat wine region is rugged, mountainous, extremely picturesque and home to some historic wineries creating bold and very complex wines. Our Priorat wine tours provide you with a wide range of wine experiences in a truly lovely wine region. As with everything we do across our portfolio of tours these wine experiences are fully customizable to suit your style and budget.

Less than two hours’ drive from sophisticated Barcelona, you are transported into a world of lovely wine and landscapes. Some stylish new builds will greet you but also lots of historic and artisan-style wineries.

• 

Priorat Wine Tours – 1, 2 or 3 days?

You have a number of options to make the most of your trip. We would love for you to stay overnight in the Priorat to fully soak in the terroir. However, we know you may not have time or the budget so a day trip, or a series of day trips, can be easily made from Barcelona. If you have the time we would ideally have you visit and stay overnight in neighboring Penedes, then move to Priorat, stay overnight there, finally on the third day, drive back to Barcelona to complete the circuit. This would be the absolute ideal itinerary in our opinion but does require the time and extra expense of course.

In any program, Falset will probably be our first stop. This small town is the capital of the Priorat region and here we will take a look at the “wine cathedral” belonging to the agricultural cooperative which was designed by Cesar Martinell I Brunet, a disciple of Gaudi. This is a strange-looking building seeming a bit out of place in this small village, visual impact is something that Gaudi was particularly good at.

• 

• 

Note: We will have you arrive in Penedes and Priorat via Barcelona hence we will have a chance to show you a few works of Gaudi, not least his striking Casa Batllo and the incredible Sagrada Familia.

In Falset you will enjoy an introduction to Priorat wines with Enric, a well-respected wine professional. In the lovely surroundings of his Falset wine bar, we will sample various incarnations of the local grape and have them explained to us: aromas, tastes, terroir, and growing practices.

Then it’s the short drive through the countryside to Gratallops, a small town with a very high concentration of wineries. En-route you will start to see the challenging conditions that local grape growers face. Very steep slopes are the norm, sometimes with terracing, but with many just having very steep slopes. Manual pruning and harvest are tough to work.

• 

In Gratallops we will visit a couple of small, intimate places such as Celler Cecilio where the owner and winemaker will show us around personally. The place is a real treat, plenty of photos will be taken and we will of course enjoy a premium tasting. Depending on time we would like to include at least two more places, but this may be tight on a one day visit, but in any case, we will certainly see the historic Scala Dei. Other visits such as Terra Dominicata, Igneus, or Buil & Gine will be included if we have two or three days in the area.

Overnight option: If you feel like splurging then the Terra Dominicata hotel is a great option. There are a number of options, in any case, so please let us know your budget and travel style.

The historic Scala Dei winery is the jewel in the crown of all Priorat wine tours. Founded in the 12th century by Carthusian monks (see notes about the monastery below) this winery is a contrast of new and old, in its buildings as well as its winemaking techniques. You will see modern stainless steel tanks and “old school” concrete and wooden storage and aging as you walk around. The classic regional grapes of Garnacha and Cariñena are once again being blended for wines such as the iconic Cartoxia line, very fruity, and very little influence of oak.

• 

• 

If you are staying for two days it will be easy to include a visit to the original Monastery just up the hill from the Scala Dei winery. There are a number of great places to eat on our Priorat wine tours, the square where Scala Dei is located is definitely one of them. A lovely upscale option is the Alma Mater restaurant at the Terra Dominicata winery itself.

If walking up to the monastery is not enough exercise to work off the calories being gained on this trip then we can arrange a number of active pursuits among the vines such as gentle to moderate hiking, biking and quads.

• 

• 

Taking the complete Spanish Wine Triangle is a really great way to get to know not just the most famous wine region of Spain, La Rioja, but also some places like Penedes and Priorat which are more “niche” but have excellent wines and are extremely beautiful to boot!