Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours, led by Annette Schiller, took place from Sunday, September 06 - Sunday, September 13, 2026.
Being
the northernmost wine region of Italy, Alto Adige is a very
special place where Italian and German traditions merge. It is a
fascinating and unique region in the Alpes. It boasts of an
extraordinary variety of landscapes: snow-capped mountains in the
Dolomites, fertile valleys, streams, century-old breathtakingly
beautiful towns true to their hybrid Germanic-Italian culture.
During this tour we did not change
hotels. We stayed 7 nights at the famous, beautiful 5-star Art-Nouveau
style Parkhotel Laurin in Bozen.
See:
Day 5 - Tasting at Weingut Tiefenbrunner, Lunch and Tasting at Weingut Elena Walch, Dinner at Thaler Arome Restaurant
(1) Tasting at Weingut @Tiefenbrunner with Owner Christof Tiefenbrunner in Kurtatsch. Christof joined us for part of the tasting. Weingut Tiefenbrunner is one of the oldest and most prominent estates in Alto Adige. Their vineyards span an extraordinary altitude range from 200 to 1000 meters above sea level. They are highly celebrated for their Mueller Thurgau Vigna Feldmarshall von Fenner, which us grown on a high plateau at 1000 meters.
(2) Lunch and tasting at Elena Walch Tramin Founded as an independent project in 1985 by architect Elena Walch, the family-run estate has been a driving force behind the region's quality revolution. We met at Vigna Castel Ringberv, the largest single vineyard in Alto Adige, overlooking Lake Caldero.
(3) Dinner at Thaler Arôme, an upscale rooftop restaurant in the heart of Bolzano. Elena Walch
The Elena Walch winery traces its roots to 1869 in Termeno (Tramin), the South Tyrolean village
widely credited as the birthplace of Gewürztraminer, whose name derives from the town itself. For
generations the estate remained a conventional family winery until 1985, when Elena Walch, an
architect by training who had married into the Walch family, took charge and became the first
woman in South Tyrol to run a winery independently, at a time when the local wine industry was
almost entirely male-dominated.
Elena Walch brought an outsider's clarity to the role, replacing much of
the traditional Vernatsch plantings with international and aromatic varieties better suited to fine
wine production, and introducing South Tyrol's concept of true single-vineyard "terroir wines,"
separately vinifying grapes from her two flagship sites: Kastelaz, a steep clay slope above Termeno,
and Castel Ringberg, a limestone vineyard crowned by a seventeenth-century
castle overlooking the Kalterer See / Lake Caldaro. Both sites were later included in the region's
official Vigna registry, guaranteeing their single-vineyard origin. The Gewürztraminer Vigna
Kastelaz, in particular, earned Elena Walch international recognition as a benchmark for the variety
and the informal title "Queen of Gewürztraminer."
Today her daughters Julia and Karoline run the
roughly 137 acres estate in the fifth generation, continuing their mother's sustainability-minded,
terroir-driven philosophy across Tramin’s and Kaltern’s varied soils.
Castel Ringberg Overlooking Lake Caldero
LunchCellarTastingAlto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours: Already Released and Forthcoming Postings
Monastery Tour, Vineyard Tour and Wine Tasting at the Neustift Monastery in Brixen - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Lunch at Granpanorama Hotel Sambergerhof, Famous for its Uninterrupted 54-kilometer Panoramic View of the Dolomites Chain - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Lovely Al Fresco Dinner in the Alleys of Old Town Bolzano at Franziskaner Stuben - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Lunch and Tasting at Elena Walch at Castel Ringberg, Overlooking Lake Caldero - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Dinner at Thaler Arome, an Upscale Rooftop Restaurant in the Heart of Bolzano - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Cellar Tour and Tasting at Manincor, a Biodynamic Pioneer and Flagship Winery of the Region, with Owner Count Michael Goess Enzenberg - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Lunch at Alpin Hut Oberholz up in the Dolomites 6300 Feet Above Sea Level - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Tasting at Cantina Kurtatsch, a Premier Cooperative, with a Spectacular View of Adige Valley - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Extensive Vineyard Tour, Tasting and Lunch at Alois Lageder, a Historic, Family-run Flagship Winery in Alto Adige, with Sarah Daval, Weinakademiker - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Tour and Tasting at Tenuta Hofstätter in Tramin, a Flagship Winery of the Alto Adige Region, a Pioneer of Vigna (Single Vineyard) Classification in Alto Adige, with Fourth-generation Owner Martin Hofstaetter - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy WineTours
Farewell Dinner at Restaurant 1500 (1 Star Michelin) up in the Vigiljoch above Lana (Reachable only by Cable Car), with Chef Daniel Sanin and Sous-Chef Jonas Graber - Alto Adige 2026 by ombiasy
WineTours
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