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An historic winery, ruins of a Jesuit mission, and the Presidential ranch. 

Colonia del Sacramento is a great destination at any time of year.  The town's cobblestone streets, Portuguese and Spanish constructions that recall the rivalry between two great empires, and the beautiful, sandy beaches invite you to sit, relax and enjoy the panoramic view over the River Plate.  The department, or province, of Colonia over which Colonia del Sacramento is the administrative hub, offers even more fascinating sites scattered over this broad southwest corner of Uruguay.  We'll explore these off-the-beaten path destinations in Colonia during our long weekend in mid-March 2027.  

The Calera de las Huérfanas, the lime quarry, ranch and mission church that were established by the Jesuit brotherhood in the mid-1700s, invites reflection on the labor and resources devoted to constructing the first European outposts on both sides of the river in the colonial era.  Wine-making, another part of colonial culture, accelerated with the arrival of European farmers and vintners.  The Cerros de San Juan winery, founded in 1854, preserves much of the original equipment and continues with the traditions and techniques that make its wines among the country's most celebrated.    The Anchorena ranch, donated by a scion of the wealthy Anchorena family from Buenos Aires, became a retreat for the President of Uruguay in the 1960s and more recently opened much of its 1400-hectare grounds to visitors.  We'll see these sites and more during our fun weekend at the end of the South American summer.       

We enjoy ten days seeing some of the most beautiful sights south of the Equator. 

The elegant city of Buenos Aires, the wild Patagonian coast and the wine-making region along the eastern slope of the Andes Mountains offer some of the best and most varied sightseeing in the Southern Hemisphere.  We’ll meet in the nation’s capital, Buenos Aires, an exciting, energy-filled city on the Atlantic seaboard, “The Paris of South America,” and home of tango and steak houses serving beef raised on the Pampas grasslands.  

We’ll see the local sites and acclimate to the warm weather (we arrive in the middle of the Southern Hemisphere summer), and then fly south to Chubut Province and explore the ranches and towns founded by Welsh immigrants and the terrain and coast of the Peninsula Valdés Nature Preserve. We’ll experience life here in this vast, windswept region at the “end of the world” before heading to Mendoza, at the foot of the Andes, and visit the wineries that have made Argentina one of the world's most important producers of deep, rich red wines.    

Upon returning to Buenos Aires we’ll finish with a fun excursion across the river to Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay, a picturesque Portuguese outpost from the colonial era that later attracted Italian immigrants who became the country’s first homesteaders.      

Join us to experience the world's greatest yearly celebration and magnificent Iguaçu Falls in Brazil's subtropical jungle.   

No city throws a party like Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  Rio's Carnaval season starts in January (mid-summer) and becomes a full-blown festival of music, dance, light and color culminating in the samba parades in the last few days before Lent.  We'll see Rio--the Marvelous City--at its most colorful, and also see the sights that make this a world-renowned destination at any point of the year--iconic Sugar Loaf Mountain, the Corcovado and the dramatic Christ the Redeemer statue, and the beaches of Ipanema and Copacabana.  Then we'll fly to Iguaçu Falls and enjoy two full days exploring what's likely the world's most beautiful waterfall and the surrounding national parks.  The program provides a complete itinerary with ground transportation, hotels, round-trip airfare from Rio to Iguaçu and an easy-paced program that allow us to see and enjoy at our own pace.  

Join us for a 13-night excursion to see Rome, Florence, Siena, Pompeii, the Isle of Capri and the beautiful Amalfi Coast.     

Italy has almost unlimited sights to see but we've chosen the best in this two-week adventure for our October 2026 program, from Rome, to the cities and hill towns of Tuscany, to the Amalfi Coast with the fabled island of Capri and the nearby ruins of Pompeii.  We’ll start in Rome, exploring the great monuments from the Empire, including the Colosseum, the Forum and the Pantheon and the fabulous art and architecture in St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican Museums.  Then we're off by train to Siena, a picturesque small city in Tuscany and our base to see nearby Florence, the lovely town of San Gimignano and the famous tower at Pisa.  We'll head south to Salerno, on the Amalfi Coast, with two full days to see beautiful villages that cling to their seaside cliffs and Capri, the site of the grand villa of Emperor with its stunning views of the sea, and a day to explore the vast archeological site at Pompeii, near the slopes of Mount Vesuvius.  Our hotels in Rome, Siena and Salerno offer us easy  access to all we want to see and time to sit, relax and enjoy the food and the relaxed culture of the Mediterranean.  

Join us in one of our many custom trips through this picturesque region along the French border. 

Piedmont and the Cottian Alps offer an excellent combination of history, culture, great food and some spectacular landscapes.   The small towns, cities and villages here provide a chance to experience Italian life up close, at a relaxed pace.    Turin, the regional capital, the long-time residence of the dukes and kings and the center of Italian car manufacturing (Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Ferrari) features beautiful palaces, parks and downtown streets with long porticoes that invite passersby to their many cafés and shops.  The vineyards of Langhe, Roero and Monferrato, to the southeast and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, produce Barolo, Barbaresco and Dolcetto wines, some of the country's best. To the west are the Cottian Alps and the Waldensian Valleys, the homeland of the Waldenses, the Christian religious movement from the Middle Ages that organized as a Protestant Church during the Reformation.  The craggy mountains provided the Waldenses a refuge from the Inquisition and from periodic attacks by Savoyard and French armies, but also a ghetto to which they were long confined as a religious minority.  These towns and villages and many scenic trails are full of opportunities to experience Italian life directly.

We have longstanding ties and experience leading visitors through Piedmont.   Mark's family originates among the Waldenses, and he's led many groups from North and South America to this area since the 1980s. Some folks travel to see the towns and villages where their ancestors lived, do research on their family in the local archives and meet their distant kin, while others come for the many scenic trails and sightseeing just below the French border.  Whatever your preferences, we'll see to it that you enjoy yourself in Piedmont and come away with a new understanding of the richness of Italian culture.