Chateaux & Terroirs, Half-day wine tour

We were able to book and pay for this online and found that this tour was a great way to get to know a little of Saint-Emilion and the Bordeaux region. We were on a cruise ship and this was much better value than the tours offered on board. The tourist board office (where the tour left from) was easy to find and the staff in there were very helpful and spoke good English. We enjoyed the underground church and looking round Saint-Emilion but it would have been great to have a little more time there. It was interesting hearing about the problems encountered growing grapes organically and using bio-dynamic methods at Chateau Dauphine at the tasting and we were under no pressure to buy. Bruno was a very interesting and helpful guide and coped well with the demands placed on him by some of the passengers! All in all a great tour!

The tour was worthwhile albeit not long enough to truly enjoy the lovely village of Saint Emillion.

I liked the friendly and open way the wine-making process was explained and the educational nature of the tour of the vineyard. There were no problems with booking or during the trip and I would recommend it to friends.

The driver was excellent. The van was spotless clean.Our guide was very good and attentive. All those 3 items met expectation. Now the part that was very disappointing. The wine tasting experience itself. We visited 2 chateau. The latter was significantly more beautiful than the first. The persons who guided our tastings were ok. I was not overly impressed with the knowledge or gentility of either. But the worst part was the wines...the first place presented 2 red wines . One bottle sold for $12.00 and the other for $17. They tasted worst than wines I could have bought at TraderJoes for $10. The tannin bitter after taste was so strong. There was no explanation that you could discard the wine in some " cans" for discard. Then no new glasses were offered for the second tasting which then ofcourse was mixed. The second chateau, s tasting was only slightly better. Again no explanation on where to discard wine. Very poorly done. I have been to tastings in CA in Oregon in Italy in Spain and many in France including Champagne and Burgundy. This was the worst tasting . I was so disappointed. I was prepared to buy and ship bottles back to the U.S. Why would you have us taste bottles at $12 and $17. The second chateau the bottles were retained at 15 and 19. Why would I ever ship wine of such low quality? In Burgundy I was happy to ship bottles that were $50 each. They were that good and that unique. Perhaps you need to classify the tours as avg wine served under $20. And tours that serve wines between 25 and 50 etc. Very disappointed in the quality of the tastings themselves