If you’re planning to visit Northern Portugal, a Douro Valley wine tour is one of the best experiences for wine lovers.
Not only is Douro Valley a UNESCO World Heritage site and the oldest demarcated wine region, but it’s also the only place in the world that makes port. Like how Champagne can only come from the region in France. Plus, there are some producers making delicious non-fortified wines at a great value.
Douro Valley is an easy day trip from the city of Porto. You could rent a car and drive out, but booking a full-day tour is a better way to see this beautiful region. The roads are narrow, steep, and winding. You do not want to be navigating this on your own after a few glasses of 20% ABV wine!
Side note: If you’re prone to motion sickness like I am, I swear by this anti-nausea wristband. I bring it with me on every trip I take, and it has saved me so many times.
I loved this small group tour that included a delicious lunch and a boat trip add-on. Our local guide, João, picked us up at our hotel in the morning. And my husband and I joined a few other couples in the comfortable van.
The drive is about two hours out to Douro Valley with beautiful scenery. Along the way, João shared fun facts about the history of the place, culture, and winemaking.
BTW, if you haven’t yet, make sure to grab my free Wine Tasting Planner. It has 20+ wine night theme ideas, including the exact ones I’ve used for my wine tastings. Plus, a timeline, food pairings, games, free printables, worksheets, and more. Get your copy here.
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What is Port?
Before I get too far, let me go over a few quick facts about port in case you’re not familiar with it.
- Port, or Porto as it’s known locally, is a fortified wine, meaning they add alcohol (a neutral grape spirit – usually brandy) about halfway through the fermentation process. This kills the yeast before it can finish eating the sugar in the wine, leaving a naturally sweet wine with a whopping 19-22% alcohol.
- Port was originally fortified to prevent spoilage during transit on the Douro River down to the Port shippers in Vila Nova de Gaia (across the river from the city of Porto).
- In Portuguese, a Quinta is a wine-producing estate. They’re classified on a scale of A to F (with A being the best wineries) based on categories like age of the vines, vine density, soil type, and grape varieties.
- Touriga Nacional is the preferred grape in port wine production but it’s difficult to grow so Touriga Franca is most common. There are also 100 other grape varieties allowed.
- Port can be made in red, white, and rosé styles. Red is most common and you’ll see ruby or tawny versions (keep reading for more on that).
Okay, now back to the tour…
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Quinta do Tedo Port Tasting
After a scenic drive and quick pick-up of the last couple at the nearby train station, we arrived at Quinta do Tedo, our first winery visit. They are a class A quinta that makes a few different port styles, as well as other non-fortified wines with the grapes not used in their port.
The visit started with a tour of the property, overlooking the rows of vines cresting over the rolling hills.
Grapes are hand-harvested and then placed in large stone troughs called lagares and manually crushed by human feet (yes, you read that right!). This is the traditional method called foot treading still used by some of the high-quality port producers. It helps bring color out of the skins without extracting unwanted flavors.
Eight to twelve people foot tread each lagar for two to three hours a day over three to four days. Sounds exhausting to me, but our host assured us that they keep spirits up with music, dancing, and plenty of glasses of port!
Next, we toured the cellar. We learned how ruby port retains its reddish color and fruit flavors with the use of large old oak barrels. This minimizes the effect that oxygen and oak can have on the flavors of the wine.
On the flip side, tawny port gets its brownish hue and develops flavors like walnut, coffee, chocolate, and caramel by aging in smaller barrels called pipes.
Most ports are a blend of different years. But our host explained that in great years, a port producer can decide to declare a vintage and make a port using grapes only from that year’s harvest.
The wine then goes through an assessment process to be approved as a vintage port. On average, most producers only have three vintages per decade and these wines improve in the bottle with age.
The tour ended back in the tasting room with a sampling of three ports.
The rosé was slightly chilled and refreshing with raspberry and red fruit flavors. The ruby also had some red fruit notes, plus black cherry and a hint of orange. The tawny was my favorite, with aromas of hazelnut and spices, and flavors of dried fruit.
Boat Cruise on Douro River & Lunch in Pinhão
Our next stop was an add-on to the tour, but everyone in our group opted to do the boat ride. I’d recommend it if your budget allows, although if you decide not to, you can explore the cute village of Pinhão during your free time.
As I mentioned earlier, the Douro River was important for port as this was how they transported it to the shippers in Vila Nova de Gaia. Today, the flat-bottomed boats called “barcos rabelos” are only used for racing and other displays. But the boat tour gives you a feeling of what it might have been like.
Floating along on the waters of the Douro River, we were surrounded by emerald slopes filled with rows of vines and picturesque quintas. It’s truly one of the most beautiful places I’ve been.
João passed around glasses of port for us to enjoy during the ride — a perfect aperitif to lunch.
Back on shore, it was a quick drive to the restaurant, where we had several choices of traditional Douro cuisine. My husband was brave enough to go for the octopus, which he’d never had before. This earned him the endearing nickname “Octopus Man” for the rest of our tour.
Quinta do Jalloto Wine Tasting
After lunch it was back on the road to the second vineyard. The ride up was particularly steep, but the spectacular views of the terraced vineyards were well worth it.
Right off the parking lot is one of the most beautiful landscapes in all of Douro Valley. You can see all the way down to the main town of Pinhão and follow the winding river through the hillsides.
Once we had our fill of the photo op, we were greeted by our host for a short tour. Quinta do Jalloto is a small, family-owned winery that makes non-fortified wines.
Like Quinta do Tedo, they still follow the traditional methods of hand-picking during harvest season and foot treading to produce high-quality small-batch wines.
The family also makes their own honey and olive oil. We learned that bees pollinate cover crops that grow around the vines and the olive trees help shelter the vines against strong winds.
Our tasting was on the terrace with more breathtaking views. We sampled their white, rosé, and red wines — all very tasty and they went well with the olive oil, bread, and honey pairings. The wines are very affordable and we grabbed a bottle of the rosé to take with us.
Croft Port Tasting
I’m not sure if this is usually included in the tour, but we were running ahead of schedule so at the end of the day João made a quick stop at the Quinta da Roeda estate. The vineyard was acquired in 1889 and is currently owned by Croft.
We enjoyed tasting a couple of their ports in the restored visitors center, formerly the estate’s stables. The highlight for me was exploring the grounds. It looks like something out of a postcard!
From there we headed back to Porto, napping along the way. We were dropped off in the early evening at our hotel. And João and our new vacation friends bid farewell to the “Octopus Man.”
If you’re interested in this full day guided tour, here’s where you can book it.
Where to Stay in Porto, Portugal
Most of the hotels and historical attractions are located on the Porto side of the river. The hills are pretty steep on the roads leading away from the river, so if walking uphill is not your thing then stay closer to the river.
Or if you want to be closer to the port wine cellars, you can choose a place on the other side of the river in Vila Nova de Gaia. There’s a tram you can take up to the bridge to cross over to the Porto side, where you’ll have incredible views of the two cities.
For hotel reservations, I like to use Booking.com. Just enter “Porto, Portugal” and select your dates below to see available options.
Booking.comBTW, if you’re a cat person, Porto is cat heaven. This little mustachioed guy kept visiting us on our patio. And then brought five of his friends!
Is Douro Valley on your bucket list? What’s your favorite port? Share in the comments!
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