Another beautiful morning in Tuscany.

We saved the best for last. Today we visited the vineyards and winery of Felsina. We had the VIP tour and lunch tasting and we loved every minute of it. Our guide for the day – Mateo – was awesome, as were all the others we met along the tour.

After introductions and getting acquainted, we were off. Mateo led us to the jeep as we were going to visit the entire property.

We headed over to the Sangiovese vineyards, which were right next to the Cabernet vineyards. There were smiles on the workers’ faces, as this was the last day of the harvest. They handpick the grapes in these vineyards and in the warm sun, it’s hard work. We made sure to let them know that wine drinkers appreciate their efforts. (I know, such suck-ups).

We let them get back to their work and headed up the road. There was no question why they needed a jeep to maneuver the path as we got higher. But all the bumps were worth it when we arrived.

The view down over the vineyards and surrounding area was spectacular. But there was more to come!

Up top was an old farmhouse where they dry the grapes used to make their Vin Santo. They’ve used the same technique throughout the years and it makes some great Vin Santo.

The grapes are spread out on bamboo and left to dry until December. By then they will virtually be raisins and the juice extracted is very sweet.

Before leaving, we went out on the porch for one last view. We laughed with Mateo saying they should have the tasting here as the view looked like something from a romantic movie.

Back in the jeep and back to the winery. Since they were busy, we skipped going through the winery. We know how wine is made and those Cabernet grapes needed to be processed.

Our next stop was the underground cellars where the wine is aging and waiting to be bottled. The basic wines will only stay a short time, while the Sangiovese will age for two or three years. And the Vin Santo will stay aging for seven years.

All those grapes and casks and barrels lead to the tasting. We would be tasting their wines with our lunch courses – Sparkling, Chardonnay, Chianti Classico, Chianti Classico Reserve and their shorter-aged Vin Santo.

Our first course of food were bread with their own olive oils. They make five different ones based on where the olives grow.

We also had a kale soufflé, cinghiale lasagna and the finale was wild duck – three ways! Oops, plus a grape cake with the dessert wine. Everything was delicious and and went perfect with the wines.

We finished with a visit to the enoteca to make sure we’d be able to enjoy the wines again and remember the great people we met.

This was our only excursion for the day and it was all we needed. What a great place to end our time in Chianti.

I always feel a bit sorry for our drivers. We come back and tell them how much we liked the food and wine, while they just sit and wait. But they do a great job of getting us to and from our tours.

Back at the hotel, we just relaxed for a while. It was a nice afternoon and we just enjoyed the hotel grounds. We did sneak in a little nap too, however, that was broken by the sounds of barking dogs and then a few gunshots. Our guess – cinghiale on the menu tonight!

We went down for dinner in the evening before retiring to get a good night’s sleep. I didn’t mention earlier, but we woke up when we received a text that Aaron Judge had broken the home run record. We watched the highlights a couple times then went back to sleep.

Tomorrow we head to Montepulciano.