Winery Experience near Florence

Hi there,
My friend lives in Florence and they do wine tours all in the area..I'm setting up a trip for my mother and I(including a wine tour)..They have one in San Gimignano as well..and can customize it for a group..and have pick-up etc..Let me know if you want more details and I can help..Susan

You can get on the bus to Siena and go to one of the towns along they way. They have wine tasting rooms and restaurants and can be beautiful places to spend an afternoon.

While this isn't a winery, it is a great place to taste wines and Tuscan olive oils. We enjoyed it a lot.

http://www.lecantine.it/cantineUtente/index.php

It is located in Greve in Chianti which is easily reachable by bus from Florence. Greve also has a couple of nice restaurants within a short walk of Le Cantine.

Hi Leslie,

San Gimignano has one of the best white wines called Vernaccia di San Gimignano. I was never a white wine drinker and after I had this it's all I drink now. I order it by the case here in the states. I would recommend checking that town out...it's very cute and was my one of my favorite places. When we visited there we found this great wine bar and sat on this little patio overlooking the hills.

If you do want to see a winery here is one we went to and was easy to get there on public transportation. It was called Castello di Verrazzano (http://www.verrazzano.com/). It was only a 30 min bus ride from Florence to the Chianti Region and was near the town of Greve. It was the highlight of our trip.

It was an approx. 1 hour tour of the grounds/wine making and then we did the lunch tour option (the Chianti tradition) which was fabulous. We sat on the terrace overlooking all of tuscany which was beautiful. Each person got a huge plate of a mix of meats and cheeses (there was a vegetarian version available). Then we sampled 4 wines, and after they poured they left the remaining bottles for the table to finish (and there were only 6 of us at each table). We also sampled a dessert wine and balsamic vinaigrette. And there was also bread with olive oil drizzled over it.

I would highly recommend this place. The views were amazing and the people were so friendly!

Have a great trip!

Thanks so much everyone! Great suggestions that I'll have to spend some more time looking into. Marla- Verrazzano is exactly what I'm looking for! (as long as the walk from the bus stop in town up to the 'castle' isn't too long!)
I'll keep looking for other options along the Florence-Siena bus route...that would be ideal so we could visit Siena also.
Thanks again!

I second the recommendation that you visit Verrazzano as our visit there was one of the highlights of our 13 day stay in Italy. We were able to have people from the winery come to the bottom of the hill to transport us up, as it would be a beautiful walk, but not one that I would have wanted to do. I'd inquire as to having some of their staff pick you up. You will love the experience, however, of the tour, the 4 course lunch and all the great wines. The scenery is just beautiful. Our guide was Fillipo and he was GREAT. Enjoy!!

Iwas also at Verrazzano in May of last year and had the ( sunset tour) . This place is awesome, food,wine, scenery. Our plates were never empty.The staff were wonderful. We stayed at their B&B at the foot of the castle.
Ahhhh yust the thoughts..make me sigh
Pat

Thanks for all the responses and confirmation about Verrazzano! Have any of you taken the SITA bus from there (Greti) to Siena? Is that possible? I don't think it is from what I can figure out on the SITA website, at least not without going back to Florence first.

How long does the tour of Verrazzano last? I'd love to be able to include a wine tour in our trip but will have my 2 sons- aged 10 and 14. A couple of hours might work but if its an all day affair- maybe another time w/hubby alone ;)!