How to pack for your perfect wine holiday

So you’ve booked your exciting new wine adventure with our friends at Winerist. Be it Burgundy, Bordeaux, Tuscany, or the Douro Valley – a wonderfully fulfilling and culturally-enriching experience awaits you.

But what next? How do you extract the most out of your upcoming adventure? Well, it all starts with your suitcase. Wine tours often involve whole days of travelling from winery to winery, through chilly cellars and scorching vineyards. It’s important to be prepared to make the whole trip as enjoyable and efficient as possible.

Not sure where to start? Our handy rundown will get you on your way.

Layers

A wine holiday can expose you to varying temperatures throughout the day, so it’s important for your clothing to be practical and adaptable.

Whilst the sun may blare over the vineyard in the day, sometimes tours can transition into the late evening, presenting a dramatic temperature drop. Wine cellars, too, can be noticeably cold.

Being able to dress in easily discarded layers is definitely the key. Think light, space-saving shirts or dresses, with a couple of jumpers for the chillier times, and thin waterproofs should the heavens decide to open.

Dark Colours

Whilst your inclination may be to opt for lighter colours in an effect to tackle the heat, consider the unfortunate realities of wine tasting.

Spills, drips, spitting – even if you yourself are confident of keeping wine in a glass, others around you may not be so coordinated. Especially after a long day of travelling, walking, and drinking. Accidents happen, after all, and you wouldn’t want to ruin your perfect white dress or cream chinos!

Consider slightly darker clothing that can protect against garish stains.

Footwear

You want to look good on your wine tour, that’s a given. If you visited the perfect vineyard, tasted the perfect wines, enjoyed the perfect day – but didn’t get the perfect photos to document it, were you even really there?

However, high heels or polished dress shoes are unlikely to fare well whilst stomping through vineyards or a wet, slippery winery. Consider more practical footwear that still fulfills the brief of looking respectable. Think weatherproof boots and flat trainers over open-toed sandals or heels. Vineyards can get very dirty too – ensure you have a couple of plastic bags handy should you need to wrap-up muddy footwear.

Water Bottle

Walking through vineyards all day can be physically exerting, and with high temperatures and alcoholic beverages to contend with, dehydration is a real concern.

In the interest of avoiding post-holiday hangovers and looking after the environment, opt for a good quality, refillable, steel water bottle that will last the whole tour and beyond. And don’t forget to fill it up regularly!

In all the excitement about all the great wine you’ll be tasting, it’s easy to neglect the second most important drink in your life – water.

Portable Charger

A smart phone has infinite uses during your busy wine tour. From taking the perfect Instagram snap, to researching the winery, to keeping in touch with your jealous friends and family back home, the potential to drain your battery in just a matter of hours is plain to see.

Consider packing a robust portable charger that stores several full charges. These often take up little room in your luggage and can prove invaluable, particularly towards the end of your holiday.

You wouldn’t want to miss that perfect sunset shot of you overlooking a glorious French vineyard because of a dead battery, now would you?

Snacks

No doubt you’ll come into contact with plenty of gorgeous food during your visit – be it a fancy three-course meal, a hefty cheese plate, or an inspired wine and food matching.

At a certain point though, dining out on such rich foods non stop can begin to feel a little overindulgent. You’ll still want to keep yourself sustained throughout the day if you’re hopping from winery to winery, however.

Packing simple, healthy, long-lasting snacks such as nuts, protein bars, or canned fruit can help keep you fed and avoid the temptation to stuff your face with much more indulgent food at each stop.