Join us for a unique Porto experience at Portugal’s Sunset Coast and its famous wine cellars along the Duoro River

To register please go to https://porto2015.moniqa.org/register.

A comfortable coach will pick us up from the conference hotel and drive us through the city of Porto to Portugal’s famous sunset coast to witness the magnificent colours of the setting sun across the Atlantic Ocean – if the weather allows. A guided bus tour will help us appreciate the historic and cultural gems of the City of Porto. You can sit back and  relax and enjoy the views of the traditional buildings, the golden beaches, and the steep hills along the Duoro River.

The tour will take us to Taylor’s Port wine cellars in the heart of the historic area of Vila Nova de Gaia, from where you will be able to enjoy a grand view across the river to the old city centre of Porto. In addition to a delicious and authentic Portuguese dinner at Taylor’s Port, a tour through the spectacular wine cellars will give you technical and historical insights in the production of Port wine. Taylor’s Port houses most of the company’s extensive reserves of wood aged Port as well its Vintage Port cellars. The cellars are long cool, dark warehouses, their thick granite walls and high ceilings helping to keep out the heat and maintain an even temperature throughout the year.

Wines in the cellars age either in cask or in vat. Casks are seasoned oak barrels usually holding around 630 litres of wine.  They are used mainly to age Tawny Ports, in particular the smooth and mellow 10, 20, 30 and 40 Year Old Tawnies of which Taylor is the leading producer. Cask ageing encourages contact between the wine and the wood and intensifies the ageing process. The rich and complex aromas of maturity, such as notes of butterscotch, walnut and fine oak wood, therefore develop more quickly in a cask. Oak vats normally hold at least 20,000 litres of wine. In these impressive vessels, there is less contact between the Port and the wood.   This method of ageing is therefore used mainly for the fruitier styles of Port where the wood ageing is intended to give the wine smoothness and a degree of complexity but allow it to retain its youthful structure and freshness. Wines such as Taylor’s First Estate Reserve or LBV are both aged in vat.

For m ore information please visit Taylor’s Port website at http://www.taylor.pt/en/port-wine-vineyards/port-cellars-lodges-porto/.

All of the above and best company with colleagues and friends is offered to you for a special price (75.- €). Please make sure to register for the Conference Dinner (only valid registrations will be eligible to participate) at https://porto2015.moniqa.org/register.