I returned in October 2018, prompting this belated second review. Although we are already in 2020 I…read morewanted to document that my second visit lived up to the great memories I had. The food, the tour and the museum continue to be excellent. This time we focused on the museum floors that we did not get to visit the last time we were here we also spent more time in their shop and sampled new wines. We were touring Logroño with a couple of friends and found an excuse to bring them, since they've never visited before. However, we enjoy this museum so much that next time we are in town even if we don't have anyone new to bring, we will still visit!

You must start any visit to La Rioja here. Museum is beautiful, interesting, and the pics from here…read moreare unsurpassed. Go early in the morning for the best experience. Have pintxos on the terrace after.

This family has an impressive museum dedicated to wine. It takes you from the historical…read morebeginnings of wine in the world, over 8,000 years ago. It has dramatic videos of the production of wines. It has a huge collection of the ancient and modern equipment used in the production of wine. The museum is over 40,00 square feet. Here you can see the corkscrew collection of the Vivanco Museum of the Culture of Wine, consisting of close to 3500 pieces that show the evolution and diversity of this apparently simple instrument. We downloaded the tour narrative to our phones and we walked for 90 minutes amazed at the information and we only heard 1/2 of the story. This is a place where anyone who respects and likes wine could spend 3-4 hours seeing all the fascinating items in the collection. Totally recommend, but spend more time. There are guided tours by the staff, but they blow through in less than 90 minutes.

The views are absolutely gorgeous and stunning, and the museum is great for learning about wine,…read moreit's history, and how relevant grapes are to this area. Food in the restaurant was very nice, we were served a traditional Basque lunch of bacalao, lamb, chorizo and potato stew...

The Village of Elciego (6 km SE of Laguardia) is the home of the historic Marqués de Riscal Winery…read moreComplex (AKA La Ciudad Del Vino) and founded way back in 1858. Gayle and I took the Tour and for 10 Euros each, it was worth every Peseta. This is a first class operation all the way, starting with the Frank Gehry (of Bilbao Guggenheim Museum fame) designed visitor complex, proceeding onto various Winery operations, finishing up with a few tasting room pours, and not "letting" us leave until I found a cool item at the Gift Shop. This Winery Tour was one of the overall highlights of our Spain trip, and we only wish that we had more time to explore the Rioja Area and certain other places (like Ysios). The Frank Gehry design is an amazing sight and somehow all those modern titanium ribbons blend in well with the rest of the stone-aspects of Marqués de Riscal Winery Complex and the surrounding Village of Elciego. The silver, gold, and "dusty rose" sheets are Gehry's response to the unbroken landscape of vineyards and the associated rich tones. There is also a Luxury Hotel and Spa within the Complex. One part of the tour featured the Reserve wines that have been laid down for years. Our guide (we took the Spanish language tour) pointed out that the Winery honoured Frank Gehry by pouring a bottle of wine that was bottled the year he was born (1929) and showed us the old direct flame way the wine bottles used to be opened. This illustrates the fact that the Winery may be modern, but at the same time remains faithful to the Bodega's "old fashioned" rigorous tradition of quality. and of course those who wish to aspire to a sophisticated nose and refined palette.

Marques de Riscal is a large production winery that makes delicious wines in the Rioja region. What…read moremakes Marques de Riscal a winery worth checking out is that it is one of the oldest Rioja wineries, also you get a close up view of the cool hotel designed by Frank Gehry. Marques de Riscal does offer English tours, but definitely do your research beforehand and book the tour online, because there may only be one per day. During the tour, we got to taste tempranillo grapes as we watch the grapes get sorted, and crushed by the grape crushing machine. Our guide was very informative and there was moderate walking to be done since the Marques de Riscal site is huge. At the end of the tour, we tasted two wines, a verdejo and the crianza. These are everyday, easy drinking wines to enjoy and are well made. They also put out delicious, sliced sausage, chorizo and breadsticks you can help yourself to, which was great as we missed breakfast and were really hungry. Marques de Riscal takes security very seriously, they give you a badge when you arrive and you have to follow the guide at all times during the tour. When you do finally leave, someone needs to buzz you out of the facility. Marques de Riscal feels commercialized but their wines are undeniably good. There are also more impressive, limited production wines that they make as well so this is really a good place for wine lovers of all levels to check out.

In Santo Domingo de la Calzada, Saint James Way can be done in two ways. One is the traditional…read moremulti-day journey that passes through many towns and personal reflection points. The other is shortened to about an hour through an interesting (albeit pricey) interpretive Center right on the Camino de Santiago. This place is worth a look. The building is handsome, the exhibits are well considered, and there's a good selection of gifty stuff in the Lobby.

An amazing journey back 100 years into the original way in which local wine was made. Oddly…read moreenough, their wine is still made the same way and using much of the same equipment and processing facilities from those years. They are the last winery in Spain still pressing grapes from their own plots with their feet, at their XV century cave. Jose, the winemaker and son of the owner, Valentín Pascual, was our host for the tour and tasting. We coordinated the visit through email and he was willing to open on Sunday for our visit. Our visit began with Jose opening a stone door in the floor to dip a glass into one of the century old vats of between 7,000 and 10,000 liters of capacity vats which reside under the foundation of the street-level floor. Remarkably, it was the most recent vintage and it was a hugely fruit forward, carbonic maceration wine. This winery produces under the streets around the main plaza in town. A living museum of totally artisan wine production. Jose's grandfather, Don José María Pascual, the third generation of the family, installed a bottling machine that is still being used. They produce one red wine, Valentín Pascual. Tempranillo and Grenache grape selected from their own vineyards with an average of 50 years. Cherry red color with purple hues. Nose highlights aromas of black fruit and flowers, with light notes of citrus. In the mouth it is tasty and smooth and well balanced, with a good body and a long finish. Aged 5 months in the vats before bottling. Much of their production is made into Vermouth at a local processing facility where the alcohol content gets much higher. This was the most interesting tour of a wine facility during our 3 week, 25 winery journey around La Rioja. Just 20 minutes outside of Logroño, La Rioja,, it is a MUST SEE for any visitor.