A Backpacker’s Epiphany: 5 Reasons to Try Out Club Med

I’m a bit of a travel snob. I don’t mean snob in the sense that I only stay at five star luxury hotels or only dine on nothing less than expensive champagne and caviar in Paris.

Actually the opposite- I’m the type of travel snob who believes the really interesting travel happens off the beaten track, unplanned, and without a tour guide. I’ve hitchhiked my way through Africa, dragged my backpack through train stations in Egypt, and spent the night with plenty of bedbugs through the years. Essentially, travel for me has always been more gratifying when there’s discovery, wacky surprises, and okay, a little bit work on my part. Can you relate?

Club Med on Ishigaki Island, Japan

However, recently due to some stressful personal life events, my husband and I were just not motivated for our usual kind of travel. We did not have the energy for the hustle bustle, scary taxi rides, or price haggling. We wanted to go easy for a change.

We opted instead for a stay at an all-inclusive Club Med. Now, I’ll admit I had reservations. Isn’t the fun part of travel wandering down hidden alleys for a tiny gem of a restaurant or stumbling on a secret beach? How could I possibly enjoy just walking up to the buffet line or sauntering out to the resort pool?

Well readers, enjoy it I did. I’ll even go so far as to say that I’m looking forward to planning my next Club Med vacation.

Now, I knew little about Club Med Resorts before this trip, and I had some strongly formed misconceptions about how stimulating the experience would be. In short, I didn’t expect it would be. However, I am here to tell you that I was wrong. In fact, there are so many interesting and fun benefits to staying at one that I want to share with you.

Reason 1

Club Med resorts offer a wide array of activities including tennis, archery, water and snow diversions, yoga, bike riding, exercise classes, excursions, and most fun of all, flying trapeze. When else do you get a chance to engage in all that? Most of the activities require no extra charge; hence, you can easily try out something new. Moreover, Club Med resorts around the world are often within easy reach of places of cultural or historical interest. We left the resort one day and visited a monkey enclave and mangrove forest. In no way does your time need be limited to the pool.

Reason 2

Club Med personnel is made up of people from all over the world, which gives the resort an international vibe reminding me of a youth hostel. The staff members themselves are roaming travelers, moving to a new resort every year or so. They freely conversed with us during the day, shared drinks at the bar and sat with us during meals. This interaction presented many opportunities for having lively discussions and making friends.

Reason 3

The resort is a perfect, if not a little strange, self-sustaining world. It’s the kind of place where the person who is the receptionist is also the bartender and the trapeze artist and the magician and head of the breakfast clean-up crew (and if you were getting married, would also be the officiate performing the ceremony). It was hilarious actually to see what new role that person would pop out as next. Moreover, each night, the staff put on a show for the guests– yes, cheesy and badly adapted from the Vegas strip, but all the more fun to watch when that’s your new pal from Indonesia on the stage. Essentially, Club Med was not the sterile environment we expected in the least. There were lots of surprises and laughs.

Reason 4

If you have children, child-care is included in the cost. Amazingly, the staff whisks the little ones away for hours. If I were a parent, I can imagine that would be heaven. I’m all for creating and sharing memorable travel experiences with your children, but that is exactly the benefit of this type of resort. You are not simply dropping them off in a small room so they can watch cartoons while you sip a cocktail at the bar. The childcare is educational and cultural. On our trip, we met kids who went on nature walks, learned local songs and games, made crafts, and became amateur trapeze artists.

Reason 5

Finally, the drinks and food are free flowing all day long. As much as I love discovering a fantastic hole in the wall restaurant, I have to admit, it was lovely to have all that sustenance at my fingertips for once. The food quality overall was very good and they served a range of dishes and drinks. We stayed at the resort on Ishigaki Island in Japan, and there was no shortage of sake, awamori, goya, and beni imo (purple sweet potatoes). To be honest, we could’ve eaten burgers and fries there too if we wanted, but we were pleased to see variety and local ingredients.

Club Med resorts are located in over 100 destinations all over the world, and they are not limited to Caribbean beaches or European ski villages; in fact, locations exist in countries such as Senegal, Morocco, Turkey, and even Brazil.  If you’re feeling less than usual motivation for the uncertainty and hardship of adventure travel, I recommend breaking out of the typical pattern and giving Club Med a chance.   You might experience your own epiphany.

How to Develop Character in Your Children (and Yourself) Through Travel

For many, many people, travel has a special lure, attraction, enchantment that calls to them, beckoning from far off lands. It’s idealized by the image of a lone backpacker traversing Europe, Asia or South America, sleeping in hostels and hitchhiking if necessary.

It’s long been thought of as an activity that can’t be done with a family, especially small children; it was a choice you had to make – travel, or start a family, but not both.

However, there is a rise in the number of families who are making travel a reality, with infants and older, and they’re doing it deliberately as a way to educate, expand, and inform their children in ways that are not possible by staying at home.

Are these parents crazy? Although they’ve been asked this question many times, the reality is that they simply realize the tremendous benefits of personal growth and character development, not to mention adventure and fun, available from family travel.

So how do you use your family vacation to develop virtue? Here are a few ideas to get you thinking.

Get Uncomfortable

Although difficult for most people to do for themselves, let alone to purposefully inflict on their children, being uncomfortable actually means that you are experiencing growth.

Instead of planning the usual, touristy trip, try something new, and well… a little uncomfortable. Think about visiting someplace you might not have considered before, a location that is a bit out of your comfort zone – South America instead of Europe, Dominica instead of Disneyland.

The first time I ever traveled outside of the United States was when I was in my early twenties. My family had taken a vacation to San Diego, and we spent a day visiting Tijuana, Mexico.

During the initial half hour of our visit, I felt literally sick to my stomach. I hated it, I just wanted to run away. I had no real-life concept of the kinds of conditions that others lived in throughout the world, and when I came face to face to it, I was extremely uneasy.

Yet that trip has stayed with me. It planted a seed that has grown more with each journey, and has given me a huge heart for humanitarian work, and a desire to relieve suffering worldwide.

Extend the Stay

If you want to visit a place that you hope will have an impact on your kids, its more likely to happen on an extended trip, rather than just a weekend jaunt.

The longer the trip, the more time to experience the true nature of the place you’re visiting. You’ll have more occasions to immerse yourself (and your children) into the culture and customs.

While staying in Las Galeras, Dominican Republic we lived near an all-inclusive resort. Every few days there would be a new group of tourists arriving to enjoy their week of relaxation, and scheduled tourist trips.

In contrast, we were there day after day, week after week. We would walk to the beach, hike on trails, explore the area, visit remote beaches, learn the language, develop diverse friendships, and enjoy the changing weather conditions.

I marveled at how much more our extended visit allowed us to really absorb the ‘feel’ of the place, and I realized that it could not have been done on a week long vacation.

Consider a summer touring South America, or a semester studying abroad. The added time away from home will only expand budding realities.

Get Grateful

There’s nothing that develops gratitude as fast as coming face to face with humble circumstances. Are your kids feeling a bit of entitlement? Are they not seeing the bigger picture? Getting up close and personal with poverty can check that attitude real quick.

Despite the stigma of being unsafe, our experience has proven that visiting the ‘local’ areas can provide some of the best encounters for getting a good look at what you (and your children) have been blessed to enjoy.

While living in Costa Rica, we went to visit the home of our maid. She had a large family of seven children and two grandchildren – all of whom lived in her very humble, three ‘room’ (and three bed) home of cement, wood and corrugated tin which she had built with her own two hands.

She made us (very delicious) soup, with her limited food supply, that she prepared over an open fire. Her family allowed our family to eat first because there weren’t enough dishes and utensils for everyone.

You can’t help but feel gratitude for everything that you have when you are in a situation like that. It’s kind of like ‘shock’ treatment, bringing you back to a grateful realization of your life as it ‘really’ is.

Of course you don’t want to walk around a local area at night with all your bling and a haughty (or fearful, which is just as offensive) attitude, but you do want to get out of your comfort zone. Go shopping at the ‘local’ store, take a walk into that ‘local’ neighborhood.

If you do it with humility and an open mind, you’ll probably find very friendly people who will welcome you into their hearts and (very humble) homes, expanding your definition of poverty and wealth along the way.

Start ‘Em Young

Stop the stigma that traveling can only be done by the single, wealthy or vagabonds. Travel can be (and is becoming) a family activity that can be done even with very small children.

Our first trip abroad as a family began when we drove from Utah to Costa Rica with our children who were 4, 3, 1 and 2 months. It was one of the greatest experiences of our lives.

We visited beautiful beaches, ancient ruins, crocodile refuges, jungle rivers. The most amazing part of it is that we actually did it. The original belief was that it couldn’t be done- too unsafe, and too much time in a car with kids- limits that were actually only in our mind. We crossed borders, not just politically, but philosophically as we widened our belief about what was possible for us to accomplish.

‘Will they remember it?’ is the question most people will ask when they consider the expense of a trip with small children. For us, we’re not concerned with whether they remember every trip, but with the paradigm that is being developed in their young minds by introducing them to the experience. They grow up believing that the ‘impossible’ is possible.

It does require flexibility and finesse to travel with little ones, but it can be done, and improved upon, with practice. There are plenty of ‘safe’ spots to see and it’s definitely worth the effort if traveling is on the agenda for your children’s education.

Give Back

Finding an opportunity to participate in humanitarian work while on a family trip provides moving experiences that bond, build character, and create lasting memories.

While living in the Dominican Republic we took the opportunity to outfit an outlying school with children’s books, visit orphanages and connect with other visiting volunteers, all of which provided memorable family experiences and created lasting friendships for ourselves and our children.

A few weeks before we were leaving the country, we still had some books we needed to give away. My seven-year-old daughter single handedly (and on her own initiative) passed out 50+ books to neighbors and friends in the area, who were more than eager to receive her gifts.

It doesn’t matter where you go, if you look for it, there’s an opportunity to contribute in some small (or large) way. Whether you donate books to a local library (or start one), visit an orphanage, dig a well or build a greenhouse, contributing to another culture develops hard work, compassion, empathy, gratitude, contribution, open-mindedness, tolerance.

Travel can be a very rewarding, as well as character developing experience, for the entire family, if you take advantage of the opportunity. Consider how you can make your next trip into a time for personal growth.

Read about author Rachel Denning and check out her other BootsnAll articles.

All photos by Rachel Denning

8 Old Colonial Hotels You Can Still Stay In

Remnants of a bygone world, these colonial memorials are places of nostalgic luxury where century-old traditions are preserved with meticulous care. Their Victorian flavour is reminiscent of Agatha Christie stories (actually, the famous writer stayed in some of them herself).

Most of old colonial hotels are as unaffordable for the average traveller as they were a hundred years ago, but this apparent shortcoming is compensated for by their opulence, charm, rich history and a long list of famous guests. Get to know some of the most celebrated hotels in the world…

Galle Face Hotel, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Opened in 1864

Facing the Indian Ocean, this very personal and unique hotel has been hailed as a masterpiece of Victorian architecture. Some of its guests have said that staying at Galle Face is alone a sufficient reason for visiting Sri Lanka.

What is more, staying at Galle Face is affordable. You can enjoy the dramatic sunsets over the Indian Ocean from its black-and-white chequerboard terrace and know that famous guests, such as Richard Nixon, Indira Gandhi, Jawaharlal Neru, Emperor Hirohito, Roger Moore, Yuri Gagarin have probably done the same.

The hotel has its own ‘landmark’ – a world-famous doorman, eight-eight-year-old Kuttan, proudly bearing the title of the most faithful employee in hotel industry. He has served Galle Face for 66 years since the days of the British Raj.

Mandarin Oriental, Bangkok, Thailand

Opened in 1876

One of the oldest hotels in Asia, the famed Mandarin Oriental (formerly Oriental) is not cheap, but it certainly lives up to its reputation of superb service and opulent luxury. With a ratio of three staff per one guest, the hotel aims to make every visitor feel like royalty.

The famous guests include almost everyone who comes to mind – politicians, royalty, designers, celebrities such as Graham Greene, Sophia Loren, Alfred Hitchkock… Joseph Conrad did not stay at the hotel, but he was a frequent visitor to the bar.

In 1888, he arrived in Bangkok to take over the command of a ship whose previous captain died at sea, and spent many an evening swapping stories of far-off places in the bar of the Oriental. A few years later he would settle in England and take up writing full-time.

Raffles Hotel, Singapore

Opened in 1887

In 1886, the Armenian Sarkies brothers took over a harbour-facing building known as the Beach House. In December 1887, the new hotel opened and was named after the founder of the British colony in Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles.

Rudyard Kipling, who arrived in the same year, noted that the food was excellent but the rooms were bad. It seems the hotel has improved a great deal since then and has a guest list that looks like an edition of Who’s Who. Charlie Chaplin, Ginger Rogers, William Golding, Elizabeth Taylor and David Bowie have all stayed there.

One of Raffles‘ legendary, even if not overtly famous guests, was a certain Dutch archaeologist, Professor Callenfels, who drank up to three bottles of gin for breakfast alone and once ate every dish on the hotel’s menu. He then proceeded to do it all over again, only backwards.

Rumoured to be the place of mass suicide of 300 Japanese soldiers in the end of the Japanese occupation of Singapore in 1945 – in fact, only one such suicide has been proven – this famed hotel withstood wars, crises and disasters gracefully and is now a celebrated national monument.

Eastern & Oriental Hotel, Georgetown, Penang, Malaysia

Opened in 1885

The Eastern Hotel in Penang – now a UNESCO world heritage site – was the first enterprise of the Sarkies brothers. Renamed Eastern & Oriental after a few years, it became commonly known as the E&O.

This hotel is one of the earliest major historic buildings still standing in Georgetown and is a charming legacy of Malaysia’s colonial past. Many of the historic features have been retained up to the present day, including the somewhat moody antique elevator and classic black-and-white tiled Victorian bathrooms.

E&O has welcomed celebrities such as Noel Coward, Herman Hesse, Rudyard Kipling and Somerset Maugham.

Pera Palace, Istanbul, Turkey

Opened in 1892, will reopen in April 2010

The grand and opulent Pera Palace was built for the use of passengers coming from Paris to Istanbul on the Orient Express. It is located in a cosmopolitan quarter of Istanbul on a hill overlooking the Golden Horn and Bosphorus, a place of symbolic significance, where the East meets the West.

Pera Palace been frequented by politicians, writers and artists. The guest list includes name such as Mata Hari, Greta Garbo, Ernest Hemingway and Valeri Giscard d’Estaing.

The hotel had a very special place in the life of Agatha Christie. She stayed there many times between 1926 and 1932, and also wrote one of her best-known stories, Orient Express, in the hotel.

Winter Palace, Luxor, Egypt

Opened in 1886

Winter Palace, built in a typical British colonial style, soon became famous for its New Year’s Eve celebrations with masked costume balls. Taking part in hotel celebrations became a symbol of status and recognition. It was said to be the ultimate privilege to have one’s yacht moored along the quayside opposite the Winter Palace.

Agatha Christie is once again on the list of famous visitors, and it might have been here she got inspiration for her many stories set in Egypt.

It was on the notice board at Winter Palace that Howard Carter first announced the discovery of the tomb of Tutankamon in 1922. The famous Egyptologist frequented the hotel until his death.

Oberoi Grand, Kolkata, India

Opened in 1890

One of the oldest hotels in India, this colonial mansion is a haven of privacy, peace and old world charm in the hectic and exhausting city of contrasts that Kolkata is.

Boasting celebrity guests such as Melinda Gates, Ricky Martin and the Queen of Bhutan, Oberoi Grand used to be the favourite destination of princely Indians and local and international celebrities alike.

It is still one of the best hotels in India and perhaps the best hotel in Kolkata, a city is rich in top of the range hotels. The grand dining room offers different international buffet every night of the week as well as an exquisite Sunday lunch buffet, popular with locals and tourists alike

Mount Nelson Hotel, Cape Town, South Africa

Opened in 1899

Mount Nelson Hotel was the fruit of the imagination and determination of shipping magnate Sir Donald Currie. The first visitors were the European high society travellers and the nouveau riche who partied and celebrated at the wake of Anglo-Boer war that broke out in the end of 1899. A young Winston Churchill was then a regular guest as a newspaper correspondent reporting on the war.

Since these troubled days, the walls of Nellie, as it is affectionately known, have survived three wars and many changes of government. They have welcomed the rich, the famous and the royal. Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., and more recently Charlize Theron, Robbie Williams, Bono and Oprah have all stayed at Mount Nelson.

This white mansion boasts breathtaking views of the Table Mountain, and is striking in its colonial grandeur that South Africa is so famous for. Mount Nelson still serves high tea in the afternoon and champagne before dinner.

Additional photo credit: Pera Palace Hotel by Inga Kastrone

Wine tasting in South America: Where to Go and What to Try

Outside of the well-known wine-producing countries of France, Italy and Spain, a quiet wine revolution is taking place in the southern cone. Down in South America, winemakers have been using European stock since the Jesuits arrived in the new world, to produce wines that are uncorked, poured, swirled, tasted, drunk, exported and lauded all over the planet.

Geography and climate dictate much of where good wine grapes will grow. Between the grape vines themselves, daily and yearly temperature fluctuations, the amount of rain and sunlight the grapes get, and even the amount of trace minerals in the soil, many factors determine the quality of the grape which vintners begin with, and the quality of the wine they can press and ferment from it. As a rule, grapes grow well at about 20-50 degrees north and south latitude. The climate that yields the best wine grapes is described as “Mediterranean,” with defined seasons.

In South America, Argentina and Chile lead the pack in production, and awards, with a few other countries, such as Uruguay, producing consistently well-reviewed wines for export, while Brazil’s sparkling wines win accolades.

Wine Tourism in South America

Wine tourism is taking hold in South America, and those from the northern hemisphere who are planning a trip should keep in mind that the seasons are reversed down in the southern cone, with the height of summer in January and February and wine harvests generally taking place in March and April.

Below you’ll find the main wine-producing, and thereby prime wine-tasting areas in South America, with a heavy focus on the big two, Argentina and Chile, a warning not to forget Uruguay, and information about wine in Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, and even Venezuela each of which are working to carve out a space for themselves in this growing industry.

Argentina

Argentina produced 2,900,000 metric tons of wine in 2007, which places it ahead of Chile in terms of production, though Argentina’s neighbor across the Andes actually exports more wine to other countries.

Visitors to Argentina will find that most wine tasting takes place in and around the city of Mendoza, which enjoys an extremely long spring and summer, and contributes to the health of the vines and the quality of the wines produced.

Argentina’s signature wine is Malbec, a red wine originally from the Bordeaux region of France. Argentina has been growing grapes for Malbec for over 150 years, but only in the last 20 has this wine truly taken off, and Argentina now produces more than 70% of the world’s Malbec. It is a dark red, and some people describe hints of blackberries and coffee beans but unless you’re a sommelier or have trained your nose with the Nez du Vin aroma set, you’ll probably just taste it and know if you like it or not, without identifying the underlying notes.

Entrepreneurial travelers and visitors to Mendoza can rent a car and fill it up with friends and strangers to visit the wineries on their own, (with a designated driver, please!), but more commonly, visitors to the area book day trips with travel agencies to take them amid the rolling hills of the wine region.

Booked-from-your home-country wine tours in Argentina generally consist of 4-and 5-star hotels and often pick up in Buenos Aires and include top-end everything, accommodations, wines and restaurants included. These tend to last from five to eight days and include the flight to Mendoza.

Wine lovers visiting the region Argentina may also like to visit areas other than Mendoza which produce excellent wines, such as Salta, to get a full picture of what Argentina has to offer. In addition to Malbec, Argentina also produces Chardonnay, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and also varieties such as Tempranillo, Bonarda, Barbera and Torrontés. Information on Argentine wines can be found on the Wines of Argentina website.

Chile

Just over the Andes from Argentina lies Chile, a diminutive strip of land sandwiched between the ocean and the cordillera, and which is exploiting its wine-growing regions to great advantage in recent years.

Chilean wines are popular exports, and its most fabled variety is Carménère, which has made a particularly big impact after the source vines Bordeaux suffered a blight and all but disappeared in their native France. In Chile the variety continues to be strong, and great efforts are made by the Chilean government to protect Chilean agriculture, including the wine industry.

Wine in Chile is not limited to Carménère, and the nation also produces prize-winning Cabernet Sauvingon, Merlot, Syrah and other varieties. As of this year, Chilean wine represents 40% of the wine imported to the United States, due both to its reputation and price-quality ratio. Chile is mainly known for its red wines, but it also produces quality white wines including Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Riesling, and even a small quantity of Gewürtztraminer. Blends and sparkling wines are also taking hold in Chile.

Chilean wine tourism, or enoturismo has taken off in recent years, with multi-day trips offered by various outfitters, which mainly focus on the Colchagua, Maule and Maipo valleys, which are not far from Santiago, though valleys north and south of the capital city also receive visitors.

A “wine train” takes wine tourists to Santa Cruz wineries, and includes tastings on the train as well as folkloric dance and talks on Chilean history, if visitors wish. Multi-day trips can be arranged in groups or privately, on train, by vehicle, or even by bicycle through the various valleys, and several wineries are easy to get to by public transportation, including the mass market Concha y Toro, which is just a few minutes from the end of the Santiago metro line.

For a complete listing the nation’s wine-producing regions, see the Wines of Chile website.

Uruguay

Uruguay, like Chile and Argentina, has a history of wine-production tracing back to its European ancestors. The country is well situated (if a bit humid in places) to produce good wines, and its shining star is Tannat, for which this small, Atlantic nation is known.

Most wine production takes place in the Canelones region, near the capital city of Montevideo. While many amateur wine-lovers would not come to Uruguay for wine tasting on its own, it is not uncommon to take a day or two here after touring some of the more selective wineries in Chile and Argentina.

Visit Uruguay’s wine website for more information about Uruguayan wines, including where to find distributors closer to home.

Brazil

Brazil is perhaps better-known for cachaça, the grain-alcohol that forms the base of the minty-lemony caipirinha, but several states in this vast country produce wines, including Rio Grande do Sul, Paraná, Santa Catarina, Mato Grosso, Minas Gerais, Bahia, Pernambuco and São Paulo, though the Serra Gaucha, north of Porto Alegre is one of the most commonly-visited.

Recently, Brazilian vintners have brought wines to tastings in Germany and California’s Sonoma. At a recent tasting held in Brazil, whites and sparkling wines were the best received, as the reds suffered from poor climatic conditions (excessive rain) that are typical of much of Brazil.

Wine tourism is doing well in Brazil, with multi-day tours and one-vineyard trips as the budget allows.

Peru

Just to the north of Chile and Argentina, where the Andes mountains grow even more soaring as they reach up into Peru, there are also several wine-producing areas where visitors can go wine-tasting.

Wine tourism in Peru is in its infancy, but that doesn’t mean you can’t take advantage of a day tour, or organize your own to one of the wineries in the principal grape-growing regions near Lima, Ica and Arequipa.

And if it turns out you don’t love Peruvian wines, near Ica is also the famous region of Pisco, for which the main ingredient in Pisco Sour (Peru’s signature drink) is named.

Bolivia

Bolivia is not exactly world- renowned for its wine, but serious purveyors of the hard-to-find won’t want to miss wines produced in this nation, which dares to grow the fruit at 5,600 to 9,200 feet above sea level, when grapes in South America are normally grown between 2,000 and 3,000 feet.

Information on this wine high-altitude wine production is available on the vinosenlatura website, the name of which means “wines at altitude” in English. Near the municipality of Tarija, you can find wines produced by Campos de Solana, for example, whose offerings include Cabernet Sauvingon and Riesling.

As in Peru, much of the wine crop is destined to the national spirit, which in this case is Singani.

Ecuador

Ecuador actually imports quite a bit of wine from Chile, but it does produce its own as well, with grapes grown at 8,000 feet above sea level, where daytime temperatures are spring-like, and nighttime temperatures drop, which increases the grape’s sugar content, and makes for good wine.

At Estancia Chaupi, they produce Chardonnay, Palomino, Palomino Fino and Meritage wines. The vineyard is located about 6 miles south of the Equatorial line and in the foothills of the Andes in the Yaruqui valley. Ecuador also produces a sparkling wine and several fruit “wines” which are not technically wines since they are not made from grapes.

Colombia

Colombia may also surprise you with the presence of Ain Karim, a vineyard that produces wines under the brand name Marqués de Villa de Leyva, which started production in the 1980s, in the foothills near Sutamarchán. In a country which is largely tropical, and in a zone which is clearly outside of the prime grape-growing here the solution was also to grow grapes at an altitude, to fulfill the need for daily temperature fluctuation. This vineyard’s website proclaims that the vineyard was formed through a combination of inspiration and insanity. It produces Riesling, a German variety and Pinot Noir, originally from France.

Another Colombian wine agglomeration brings together 70 families from 16 communities in the Consorcio del sol de Oro, which together has more than 250,000 plantings, where European specifications are followed to produce Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvingon and Sauvingon Blanc wines, exported to Bogotá (the undisputed gastronomical capital of Colombia), as well as Europe.

Venezuela

A trip through all the wine-producers of South American would be remiss in not mentioning, Venezuela, which the uninformed might also assume is too close to the equator to be able to grow wine grapes. Again, altitude is the answer, and the favorable conditions include a grater-than-30 degree daily fluctuation in temperature and good soil drainage.

The area produces two harvests per year, in September and March. Bodegas Pomar, a subsidiary of the conglomerate Polar, which produces beer and other foodstuffs in Venezuela, has spent $20 million to help develop the Venezuelan wine industry in the last ten years, and represents a hefty chunk of the Venezuelan wine market.

Bodegas Pomar grows six varieties of red grapes and five of white grapes, with hopes to expand the market, to which tourism is essential, because though wine-drinking is increasing in Venezuela, hard alcohol is more commonly drunk.

Plan your own trip

South America has wine tasting for every budget, and in many nations. If a multi-day trip to the vineyards is not in the cards, consider a day trip. Or check out events surrounding the vendimia (wine harvest) or other wine tasting events held in cities and near vineyards.

Another option is to contact local wine and liquor stores or restaurants to see if they can host a wine tasting, and if all else fails, pack a corkscrew among your (packed) baggage, and be sure to (carefully) pack some wine for the way back home. Add some cheese, crackers, fruit or a nice meal and you can find the perfect maridaje (pairing) for your libations.

Read about author Eileen Smith and check out her other BootsnAll articles.

Photo credits:
Wine glass by Alan Heitz on Flickr, Argentina by Altos Las Hormigas, Chile by Santa Ema, Winery on horseback from San Pedro in Chile, Brazil by wines at Peterlongo, Tasting menu by bearshapedsphere on Flickr