Turn up your sound and click on the picture to see more from Tuscany.

Once again the What’s On team were lucky enough to be invited by Maison Du Vin to accompany them on their latest ‘Wine Safari’ This time to Tuscany.

As we flew into Pizza airport our BA 737 banked gracefully to the left affording us a marvellous view of the ‘Leaning Tower!’ A perfect advertisement for this magical land full of history wonderful art, breath taking architecture and our main reason for visiting, the food and wine!

Tuscany is as near a perfect place for growing vines as you can get, and they have been making wine here for at least a thousand years. Not surprisingly the Tuscans have got rather good at it and we were here to taste some of the very best. Tuscany is justly world famous for it’s superlative red wines. But one of the great benefits of Maison du Vin’s Wine Safaris is that you are able to experience many things that would be denied to a mere tourist.
So it was that on our first night we enjoyed a superb dinner washed down with some of the best white wine produced in the region. The restaurant was IL Pino located in the medieval walled town of San Gimignano, famous for it’s 13 towers that pierce the skyline for miles around. The restaurant specialises in seasonal local cuisine and we can highly recommend it.
The dinner was hosted by local boutique winery Panizzi who’s vines are situated overlooking the city walls. We were all enthralled by the quality and character of there white wines made from a local grape called Vernaccia.

There can’t be a wine drinker left on the planet that hasn’t drunk Tuscany’s most famous of wines Chianti.
The highlight of our trip was a visit to Barone Ricasoli who arguably make the very best Chianti Classico, ‘Castello di Brolio.’ The Ricasoli family have lived in the castle and produced wine since 1141!
Set high in the steep hills of the Chianti region, this stunning and imposing building is surrounded by 617.5 acres of vines and dominates the landscape for miles around. We were treated to a personally guided tour of the Castle and it’s grounds, and a tutored tasting of seven of the best wines in The Risasoli range. The whole thing was rounded off by a superb lunch, with yet more Ricasoli wine. Sunday’s don’t come much better than that!

Sadly, and all too soon it was time to set off for the airport and home. We had spent three wonderful days enveloped in the vine clad hills of Tuscany eating and drinking to our hearts content, meeting wonderful people and visiting gorgeous hill top villages that seem to eye each other longingly across valleys tinged by autumn colours and bathed in mellow sunshine.

I like to think they were smiling down on us as we made our way home. We were certainly smiling up at them!