Fiery Landscapes & Fine Wines: Private Canary Islands Tour

Oh my, what a day we had. Israel picked us up right on time and we were off. He kept us informed about the history of the island, the geological events, and of course, the beautiful vistas. We thoroughly enjoyed the visit to the small winery and the wine was surprisingly good. The drive up to the mountains was amazing. Highly recommend over a shipboard excursion.

If you would like to experience more of Gran Canaria than Las Palmas, this is the tour for you. We visited volcanoes, calderas, scenic villages, a small but beautiful church, a more than hundred year old winery for wine tasting and its display of decades old wine manufacturing tools and methods, and scenic view from the highest peak in Gran Canaria. Highly recommended.

Israel was an outstanding guide! Friendly, knowledgable, informative, excellent English, and gave us a super tour!!

Israel was a great guide. He provided drinks and snacks. Took us to places where the big busses could not go and we saw amazing views of the island and nearby Tenerife island. He was knowledgable of the island's geography and history.

This day tour was a great trip. Over the course of the day you can see so much of Gran Canaria and get a real sense of the variety of landscapes across the island. It also allowed us to see areas which we probably wouldn't have gone to on our own, particularly the smaller villages. Our guide Isra's local knowledge was fantastic, and he is a very friendly and fun guide. The trip to the vineyard was very interesting, and the differences between the semi-tropical areas in the north, the pine forests in the mountains, and the arid regions to the south were all best appreciated on this tour. It was relaxed, and unrushed and it really felt like Isra cared about our day, and wasn't just rushing us from place to place. I would highly recommend this trip.

Having visited Gran Canaria and not ventured away from the hotel, beach and bars we wanted to discover more about the islands, its history and taste some wine whilst we were at. The visit to the San Juan winery brought back memories of previous visits to vinyards but Maria, with her quirky style (“look” she kept saying) made it entertaining and it was good to see pictures from the early 1900s matching the equipment that was being shown and described to us. The views of the calderas (the remains of volcanic eruptions) were amazing and my particular favourite. Our guide Isra was perfect. He had facts at his finger tips but didn’t bombard us and went at our pace. We enjoyed the church and the walk around the pretty town of Santa Brígida - it was beautiful. On a trip like this, where there is invariably a distance to drive, you want a comfortable vehicle and a safe driver. We had both. Those windy mountain roads gave us stunning views too. At one point we could see over the clouds and there was Tenerife in the distance. Amazing. All in all this was the perfect trip to get to know more of the island, its geography/geology and its wine making. We loved it.

First the positive. Israel picked us up on time and was a friendly, well-informed guide. The car was comfortable. However, the tour lasted 5 hours, not 7 (as advertised). We were picked up at 9:15am and dropped off at around 2pm. The bag lunch was sparse (eg., a package of dry crackers but no cheese or other topping). We didn’t stop at a restaurant for lunch (nor was that option offered to us)—which is probably why the tour was 2 hours short. We note in at least one other review, they stopped at a restaurant for lunch, so we’re not sure what happened there. The visit to the winery was ok. The owner is a nice 88 year old man but the winery itself is pretty old and underwhelming. The wine sample we were served was barely drinkable (a vintage, we were told, that was only 3 months old). The highlight of the tour was a visit to the highest point on the island which was very crowded with cars and people but had great views. Israel was a nice guy who tried hard to please, and I’m reluctant to provide a less-than-positive review. However, the tour was simply not worth the almost CDN$700 we paid for it.

The tour was amazing. Visited nice places, had some very good wine and food and with Israel the best Guide. We can only highly recommend this Tour!

The tour was amazing. Visited nice places, had some very good wine and food and with Israel the best Guide. We can only highly recommend this Tour!

We loved our trip with Isra and would highly recommend! Great organization (even picnic for us and kids!) and smooth, comfortable travel. He has outstanding knowledge not only about the places visited but also overall about the island history and current affairs. The vineyard visit with wine tasting, and the outstanding views from Pico de las Nieves were the key highlights but we absolutely enjoyed entire trip. It’s been a great pleasure and we will definitely contact Isra when we’re back in Gran Canaria.