As you know, Russian viticulture, like winemaking, originated in the Crimea. This happened at the end of the 19th century thanks to the efforts of the famous Russian philanthropist Lev Golitsyn. In 1894, the first wine cellar was laid in Massandra.
Untouched by time
The Massandra Wine Factory is a domestic enterprise that has not been affected by historical upheavals and even war. The factory today looks like on the opening day.
Crimean Massandra is a place with a unique microclimate. It is warm and humid just as much as the vine needs. And wine material needs low stable temperatures. For this, a huge wine cellar was laid in the rocks. The adits were cut down manually. Today they amaze with their size: 150 m in length, and 5 m in height. The work was carried out colossal: in the cellars for more than a century, even in the heat of about + 15ฬ C.
Massandra today
Massandra's modern production facility is an open to tourists, world-famous enterprise.
The most visited part of FSUE Massandra is the tasting room. Here, with a glass of incredibly tasty wine, the guides tell us about the difficult history of creating a plant and a cellar, grape bushes brought from abroad and carefully planted in the valleys, about the first wine and samples, about the emperorโs laudatory speeches and about five years later. , as Crimean wines forced many European producers, including French.
Popular Crimean sightseeing route
Tourists from many countries of the world are attracted by the Crimean village of Massandra. An excursion to the famous factory leaves no one indifferent. It begins with the yard of the factory. It has two buildings: an old factory and a new one. Then the tour moves to the Wine Museum. Its halls have a unique exposition. It allows you to trace the history of the plant and the production of wine from ancient times to the present. Most of the exhibition is dedicated to the construction of a wine cellar.
In the basement of the factory buildings there are galleries for the noble aging of wine and a tasting complex. It consists of four rooms. The first for 72 guests is made in the Greek style. The second for 35 people is called Maderny. The third room is Jerezny, and the fourth is VIP (it can accommodate only 20 guests). Always joyfully greets its guests FSUE โMassandraโ.
The tasting room, decorated in the Greek style, carries away in the era of ancient Greece. On the walls there are frescoes depicting Greeks enjoying wine and playing musicians.
Madera Hall is the deck of a medieval ship that transported barrels of Madera to Java through the Atlantic. There they matured on the hot sand under the scorching sun, which is why spicy notes appeared in the taste.
The end of the 19th century - the middle of the 20th - is the period of the formation of winemaking in the village of Massandra. Today everyone can visit the tasting room. Here are many photographs of the Crimea and Massandra's vineyards, and grape brushes can be seen on the walls. This is a tribute to the hard work of planting the first vines brought from Europe.
Excursion programs
Several tourist routes have been developed around the Massandra factory. Small excursion lasts 45-50 minutes. Guests get acquainted with the exposition of the museum, then go to the middle cellar. There they inspect the workshop in which collection wines are aged . A large tour lasts almost an hour. It begins as a Small Excursion, and ends with a visit to the Royal Cellar. It shows guests the pride of Massandra - a gallery of collection wines.
There are guided tours tailored to individual orders, ending with a mandatory tasting of nine types of vintage wines. The sample offers the best samples from port and dry wines to nutmegs.
In the production association "Massandra" the tasting room works according to a certain schedule. VIP excursions take place only in the tasting complex and are agreed in advance.
Tasting after the tour begins with "Saperavi". This red dry wine is served on the aperitif. Then the men are treated to "Sherry". After four years of noble aging, he leaves in the language notes of red- hot walnut and grated almond. The female half is served "Madera". Due to the taste of vanilla sugar and dried fruits, this wine was once used as a perfume.
Then guests are treated to the red port of Massandra, the certified pin-gris of Massandra and other branded wines.
The legendary cellars of Count Vorontsov
You can taste the famous Massandra drinks not only in Massandra. For more than 30 years, the modern Massandra tasting room has been opened in Alupka. it is located in the former cellars for storing wine laid by Count Vorontsov.
Here, on trial, guests are offered samples of ten branded drinks: dry wines, fortified (famous port of Crimea), cognac-type wines, liqueur and dessert wines.
In the tasting room, in addition to the guide, which tells a lot of interesting facts about the production and the drinks themselves, there is always a taster with great experience. He will tell you how to hold the glass and take the first sip, teach you to evaluate the taste and aftertaste of wine. There is a tasting room in Alupka, Palace Highway 26.