Bodegas Marqués de Riscal — Restaurant in Elciego

We took the 56€ wine tasting tour and it was overall a very pleasant experience.

The tour starts with a view of the hotel, they only let you look at it from afar like it’s a museum item. I understand that the people paying $1,000/night to stay there do not want to cross tourists, but disappointing nonetheless since I see pictures of other tourists who were let to see all the way to the lobby. Double standard.

The tour continues in the storage facilities, then production, and it finishes with the wine tasting. The wines were OK, one was really good. We all really loved the meats and cheese, better than average, that was high-end.

I have to mention our tour guide, Asaad, without him, the tour would have been average. But Asaad is very patient with everybody, answers all the questions and is a very pleasant person to discover the property with. Classy guy.

The wines were OK, we spent even more after the tour to taste other wines, very expensive sampling.

Overall, the Marquès de Riscal wine tour was a fun activity. Comparing to other tours, it was less informative on history but better for wine discovery. The wines are average compared to other ones in the region, Marques de Riscal just does a better job at marketing itself than others and I have to say, they do it very well.

There is attention to details and they see a lot of tourists. If it was not for Asaad, the price was too high, but he made it worthwhile and rebalanced the price/quality ratio.

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All facade, no substance. On our first day, attempted to have dinner at the vinoteca. The food took 1,5 hr, the burger arrived raw, not even warm inside. The pork sandwich was medium (one never makes pork any other way but fully cooked). The walnuts (snacks for the wine) were stale. The chocolate dessert was literally an American brownie. Poor staff was extremely stressed and very apologetic (we assured them it was not their fault). The dinner was comped. But this is not the point. The 5-star hotel cannot be showing up this way. Even in the low season. One expects high standards and consistency. But one simply senses a kiss of death which was clearly an acquisition by Marriott. We came to this place following strong recommendations of our friends, although they cautioned us that it’s not what it used to be. Do yourself a favor and stay at a place like Castilla Termal Monasterio de Valbuena - an authentic high-touch service high-cuisine place that never misses a...

When rules are more important than clients... We went there by 9.30 four wine lovers, wanting to taste, buy and check the hotel for our next stay. Here what happened : none at the reception, or in the shop which is strange but could be a simple miscommunication about opening times. No problem. But the security guy takes control: you can't access the hotel, unless you have a reservation. Hmm, fine. We park the car. No, you can't park there, park ten meters further. Hmm, OK. Since still none at the shop we want to walk around discover the place until we wait. No, you can't walk over there. Really? We are supposed to sit outside waiting for the staff to show up? When? He does not know. Well, when rules are more imports than your clients, think hard if it is worth putting money in your wonderful facilities or rather train your staff? We loved Marqués de Riscal before visiting, but now the experience turns the wine sour. A shame on...