Luxury Travel Advisor - April 2008 - (Page 68)

TRAVELING GOURMET Beautiful Places We recently tooled around Napa and Sonoma counties with Liza Graves (liza@beautiful-places. com; 707-996-0266) of Beautiful Places (www.beautiful-places. com). The company provides lavish estate and villa accommodations in one of our favorite regions in the entire world as well as pre-arrival concierge services, such as securing a private chef, a bonded nanny, and even massage and spa treatments. And, prior to arrival at the villa, BP will stock up on your favorite food, wine, flowers, toiletries and even magazines. When it comes to the traveling gourmet aspect of the trip, Graves and her team will pair your client up with a private car and driver who is savvy about some of Napa’s most-hidden boutique wineries. We hear that BP recently prepared an itinerary for a birthday-celebrating client whose instructions were to “blow away my guests.” It included private wine tastings in Napa, dinner prepared for 10 by a private chef, afternoon tea and croquet at Meadowood, (see Luxury Travel Advisor, March 2008) spa treatments for all and dinner at Kuleto’s winery. The villa we visited was the Tuscan-style Domaine Beau Soleil in Napa (living room, shown left and infinity pool, shown bottom left), whose olive trees that Thanksgiving weekend were ripe for the picking. It’s an ideal venue for families to relax in a breathtaking setting (Note: the views of the hills and valleys go on forever and ever). We were particularly enamored of the guest cottage just off the pool, which we felt would be ideal for those traveling with rambunctious teenagers who might need their own space. Graves also brought us to The Terraces at Quarry Vineyards (www.terraceswine.com), whose dashing young winemaker, Nate (nate@terraceswine. com), escorted us all around the vineyard’s rustic acres (shown, bottom right) where we spied a fawn darting down a hill; he even showed us the vineyard’s cache of authentic fermenting balsamic vinegar. We concluded our visit in the main house, with Nate leading a fascinating discussion on winemaking. We sampled the wines, which were splendid. We recommend the 2006 Napa Valley Chardonnay and the Petite Syrah. Big news: BP reports that it has expanded into Punta Mita, as well as Tuscany, where an option is to stay at the 17-room Villa Pegnano. —Ruthanne Terrero 68 LUXURY TRAVEL ADVISOR | April 2008 http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/lta0408/?startid=52 http://www.beautiful-places.com http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/lta0408/?startid=52 http://www.beautiful-places.com http://www.terraceswine.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Luxury Travel Advisor - April 2008

Luxury Travel Advisor - April 2008 Contents Publisher's Letter Editor's Letter London DESTINATIONS India Greece HOTELS Golf Royal Hideaway Playacar Chateau Marmont SPAS Hawaiin Spas Southeast Asia CRUISES: Antarctica Cover Story: Rocket man The Pulse Traveling Gourmet Jetset Sightings Source List

Luxury Travel Advisor - April 2008

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