We were picked up by Ampora by our Mendoza-born guide, Melanie. We were the first of only two couples on the tour, and for a second we were quite nervous; what if they were were 50 year old grumpy old people? To our great luck, we were surprised when a 30-something year old British couple jumped aboard the bus, Richard and Helen, and Richard was wearing those weird toe-hole feet shoes. But yay, we fit in and weren't going to be ostracised the entire day!

The Lujan de Cuyo wine region was a mere 15 minute drive away from Mendoza city, and the first winery, Clos de Chacras was one of the oldest wineries in the district. We met our tour guide, Jessica, and tasted our first wine for the day:

• Cavas de Crianza Chardonnay

that was every so casually served at 9.30am - breakfast wine! Jessica then took us on a tour of the wine making side of the vineyard, explaining the process of getting the grapes off the vines and into wine bottles, and showing us the appropriate machinery as it applied. She showed us the old concrete tanks still in place from 1921, and also the adapted and modified version that they use today. Next we headed inside to taste three more wines:

• Cavas de Crianza Blend
• Eredita` Cabernet Sauvignon
• Gran Estirpe Malbec

I think my favourite of the three was the Blend - probably since Richard and I realised that a blended wine is much better and differently valued than, say, a blended whiskey.

The next stop was my favourite winery of the day, Pulenta Estate. Owned by an Italian family that migrated to Argentina, the winery chateau housed an enormous barrel collection in the old converted concrete tanks, and two Porsche engines and a Ferrari engine (Melanie and Helen hung back while Richard, Jeremy and I curiously had a look). There was also a strange room down in the basement that looked very Bond-villain-esque lair with portraits of the original owners hanging on the walls. Next was the tasting. Each of the wines was paired with a different cheese. The first wine we had already drunk while touring the estate, a:

• La Flor Sauvignon Blanc

but the following wines were all paired:

• Gran Pinot Noir paired with quince paste
• Pulenta Estate Cabernet Sauvignon paired with a blue cheese
• Gran Pulenta Malbec paired with Andean goat cheese
• Gran Pulenta Cabernet Franc paired with Reggiano parmasan cheese

Everything they gave us was 100% full of rennet or gelatin, but they went too nicely with the wines to ignore them. From this winery, I quite liked the Cab Sav (surprising everyone!) while the boys really liked the Cab Franc, so much that they both bought a bottle.

The third winery was quite small, and was very different. Caelum, the winery was called. Our tasting there consisted of four wines - a rose, a typical torrontes, a cab sav and a sweet wine, all served with pistachio nuts picked from the trees around the vineyard. The wines were:

• Caelum Rose
• Caelum Torrontes
• Caelum Reserva Cabernet Sauvignon
• Nuvola Dolce Malbec

All four were quite different to other wines since Caelum harvests their grapes earlier than everyone else. And their sweet Malbec - oh my goodness that was yum! Normal harvest instead of a late one and they hang their grapes to dry.

The final stop was lunch at the Dominio del Plata. Here we enjoyed a five course lunch paired with different wines:

• Susana Balbo Torrontes paired with a salsa of lemon, avocado, apple, zucchini flowers, leaves ...
• Benmarco Cabernet Sauvignon paired with a pate` (I had a pate-to)
• Crios Limited Eddition Tannat paired with a tuna carpaccio (polenta crisps, potato, eggplant and tomato)
• Benmarco Expresibo/Crios Chardonnay paired with a steak (polenta blob)
• Susana Balbo Late Harvest Torrontes paired with dessert - alfajores, blue cheese and pecans, dulce de leche.

We were all so, so, so, so full by the end of the day, and quite tipsy, and Melanie told us that it felt as if she was taking her friends out for the day rather than a tour group which was quite sweet. It was definitely a tour worth splashing out on, and we didn't need to make dinner since we were so full from lunch!