Book your individual trip , stress-free with local travel experts. Select Month. In recent years, the city has seen a massive tourism boom and this is reflected in the many hotels now on offer, many of which are of the boutique variety. It was once a wild and unpredictable river, though after the port-producing area was first demarcated in the eighteenth century, engineering works soon tamed the worst of the rapids and opened up the Douro for trade.
Crafted with by local experts. A cellar tour here see The port wine lodges forms an integral part of any visit to Porto, while you can also follow the wine trail along the Douro by train, car or cruise boat. Portuguese wines quickly filled the void and, following the Methuen Treaty , the wine trade became so profitable that adulterated inferior wines were soon being passed off as the genuine article.
The grapes are harvested at the quintas vineyard estates from September to October and crushed. Port wine is either ruby ie deep red , tawny made from a blend of differently aged wines or white β the first two are generally drunk at the end of a meal, or with cheese or dessert, the last served chilled as an aperitif.
The finest reds are known as vintages, wines from a single year that are bottled two to three years after harvest and left to mature. A vintage is only declared in certain years just fourteen times between and , for example , and the wine is only ready to drink at least ten to fifteen years after bottling, when the flavours are at their most complex, the wine deep purple and full-bodied.
All other ports are blended and are kept in the cask for between two and seven or more years, with the colour developing into various shades of of tawny β they are ready to drink when bottled. Other exhibitions are held in the separate, pink Art Deco Casa de Serralves in the grounds.
