I just discovered “Tincho” from Argentina.

“New Age” from Argentina was recently displayed at my local grocery wine department as the latest rage in Argentina. Since Anne and I are leading our upcoming Wines and Adventures in Argentina trip with our friends from Arista Wine Cellars in Edmonds, WA, I figure we better get in the know. Turns out, it’s been around Argentina for while now, and especially popular in a hot day in sophisticated Buenos Aires. Now is seems to becoming all the rage in the US. I can see why…

The profile description under the bottle written by the wine steward read that it’s best as a refreshing drink in summer (which is happening right now in Argentina) over ice with lime or lemon. I rushed home to give it a taste. Wow! It’s a Sauvignon Blanc (50 percent) and Malvasia (50 percent) from Mendoza, Argentina. New Age is very light-bodied, but utterly crisp and clean with a light effervescence that gives it a refreshing sparkly quality. It has a floral and peachy nose and is quite sweet on the palate with honeydew melon, apricot flesh and zesty citrus fruit. Millions of Argentineans pour it over ice with lime which really helps cut the sweet—otherwise it’s not unlike a Riesling. It’s under $10 and because it’s also under a screwcap you can keep it in the fridge and enjoy over several days. I’m sure it will taste even better in Mendoza when we hit summer early in March!

The Back Story: In the early 1900s an Italian man named Valentin Eduardo Bianchi immigrated to Argentina and created the Bodegas Valentin Bianchi winery, now one of Argentina’s oldest. Decades later his grandson enters the world and was nicknamed "Tincho" which means "young Valentin".
As the story goes, Valentin Jr. poured the New Age wine over ice, added a little lime and voila - the drink is now called a “Tincho”. Tincho is hyped as Argentina's number one drink of choice, and I can definitely see why. What's great is this wine is only between 9-10% alcohol, much lower than other wines, so you can have a few more Tinchos!

Mendoza Cooler: Then as soon as I published my discovery on my personal Facebook page the first comments was from former Wildlander and professional barkeep, Gregg Burke who shared this cocktail recipe:  In a shaker. Three lemon wedges. Top with ice to fill. Add vodka (your preferred brand) 2.0 oz, Saint Germain 1.0 oz, Tincho 6.0 oz. Shake vigorously. Strain over ice. Top with club soda. Garnish with a twist.

Kurt Kutay

President

Have any questions about travel to Argentina? Ask me! 

Check out all of Wildland Adventures new trips.  

New Places We Plan To Go In Far Off Lands

We always have new places we plan to go, great guides we know in far off lands to share with you, and new trips we have in design that we have not yet announced. Often our alumni travelers ask us to design new trips to places they want to go so they can travel there in our more authentic and in-depth Wild style of exploring the world. Or, sometimes we turn our own vacations into Wildland exploratory trips like Jeff Stivers did when he turned a trekking trip into the jungles of Borneo into one of our first new forays in SE Asia as our Untamed Borneo Adventure. We are also often approached by outfitters and guides in far flung places who want to introduce our travelers to their country, family and friends. Indeed, the best thing about what we do is developing new trips through our expanding network of friends and family throughout the world, and introducing them to you when you travel with us.

Wildland Adventures Program Director, Jeff Stivers (far right) leads our first group tour to Borneo. 

Following is a short list of trips and travel plans we have in the works that are forthcoming and to be announced soon in 2013. In fact, we already have itineraries and guides in place for most of them so if you would like us to design a custom trip to any of these places let us know. Or, watch for an invitation to join us on one of our inaugural departures often accompanied by one of our senior staff.

Myanmar (Burma)
Contact Laura Finkelstein, our new SE Asia Program Director if you want to travel to Myanmar. She came to Wildland with prior adventure travel experience throughout this part of the world including designing trips in Burma, working with an engaging Burmese woman, Cho Cho, who loves to share the beauty of her culture and introduce travelers not only to religious and historic sites, but also to experience daily life in markets, exploring down side streets, visiting farmers and families at home in rural villages and experiencing Buddhist practices we encounter everywhere.

Our Burmese tour guide and in-country coordinator, Cho Cho, loves to share village life of Myanmar with Wildland travelers. 

Colombia
Bordered by Pacific and Caribbean seas, situated in the northernmost stretch of South America connected to the Central American Isthmus, and with some of the highest mountains in the world, Colombia is spectacular and diverse. Dubbed the "comeback kid in tourism" we are excited to be announcing our first foray into Colombia where we visit Bogota, coffee plantations and highland forests of the Andes, and the incredibly diverse habitat of Tayrona National Park in the mountains rising out of the Caribbean concluding in the beautifully romantic World Heritage city of Cartagena. Contact Kirsten Gardner for more information about travel to Colombia.

Brazil
Several of us have traveled to Brazil in the past few years. It's such a big country it's taken time to get enough feet on the ground to really know how to get around, where to go (because you just can't do it all in one trip as distances are far), and to develop local contacts throughout the distinct regions of the country. Anne and I traveled from Sao Paulo to Rio down the Atlantic Rainforest Coast visiting local Afro-Brazilian communities, exploring the beautiful historic coastal town of Paraty, sea kayaking among coastal inlets and tropical islands, and exploring Rio. Sherry traveled the coast of Salvador, Bahia dancing to Afro-Brazilian rhythms with her dance troupe from Seattle. Kirsten has spent considerable time planning various itinerary options with our lead guide and Brazilian ecotourism outfitter featuring the best of the Pantanal, Amazon, the Atlantic coastal rainforests, and Iguazu. And, now in January 2013, Gabi Assis, a native Brazilian experienced in adventure travel, has joined us as a new intern who will help us finalize all the details of our new Wildland Adventures in Brazil!  Contact Kirsten Gardner for more information about travel to Brazil.

Anne and Kurt Kutay exploring the Atlantic rainforests  designing new Wildland Adventures Brazil tours. 

Turkey
Although Turkey is certainly not a new destination for Wildland, we are redesigning our flagship trip, Turquoise Coast Odyssey, to bring back into that itinerary a family home stay in a remote village that is always a highlight of this amazing trip. In the past our visit with the family was sometimes problematic because we all stayed in their old Ottoman village house with just one bathroom and several rooms with just curtains instead of doors. Their new family home just finished has 5 private bedrooms with their own private bathroom so everyone can be assured of privacy and comfort during these amazing days in a remote Turkish village in the coastal highlands above Antalya.

India
India is so vast, we have many itineraries we are designing and already offer custom travel planning throughout the country. The latest new trip to be announced in the coming weeks is our India Yoga and Cultural Adventure combing an individual yoga experience (for guests at any level) at a lovely resort and retreat center near the beach in Goa with a week cultural exploration around the Golden Triangle including Delhi, the Taj in Agra, and immersion into the ancient spiritual city of Varanasi on the Ganges River. Learn more about all our trips to India.

Nicaragua
Grettel Calderon, our Central America Program Director, is planning an exploratory trip to Nicaragua this year to create several new Wildland Adventures there. From volcanoes to cloud forests, kayaking around islets on Lake Nicaragua, visiting highland villages and coffee plantations, and luxuriating in the rainforests and beaches of San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua has something for families, couples and active travelers of all ages. There are many new ecolodges we are going to explore and plan into the design of several new tours of Nicaragua.

keeping it wild,

Kurt Kutay

Tensions Running High in the Jungles of India

Tension is running high in the jungles of India this week. Challengers to both tigers and tigresses in various tiger reserves have been adding conflict and intrigue to daily squabbles, and injuries are the inevitable result.

The Princess of the lakes, Satra, is limping badly in Ranthambore. Blue Eyes is hurt and rumor has it that Vijaya has a swollen leg in Bandhavgarh National Park. All this activity points to the testosterone-fueled blood that flows through wild tigers' veins as individuals mature and the young begin to dominate over the elders.

An ambush of tigers. Madhuri and her family in Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve / December 2012.
(c)  Faroque Khan  from Tiger  Nation (www.tigernation.org)

Tiger safaris are in full swing now during the summer in India. We are looking forward to hearing back from our travelers about their sightings. When I was in Bandhavgarh 4 years ago I saw B2 close up next to our vehicle. He was legendary as the dominant male in the park for many years:

"B2" was the dominant male of Bandhavgarh National Park. 

Before I returned in 2012 he had subsequently died in November 2011 after a territorial fight, but not before leaving a legacy of his formidable genes in his descendants you might see today on our Tigers and Travels of India. For more information about travel to India contact: Wildland Adventures India Program Director, Laura Finkelstein at Laura@wildland.com

Keeping it wild,

Kurt Kutay

For more on my travels in India check out our latest film from India: Tigers and Palaces: Adventures in India
Source: Tiger Nation 

Catering to Boomer Travelers, Part II

In my initial response, Catering to Boomer Travelers Part I, from a query I received by a Wall Street Journal writer asking us how boomer travelers ages 50 plus can live an interesting life into their senior years I replied, "Travel, of course!!"

She also asked me what kinds of trips we offer and some revealing characteristics that distinguish our adventure travel company from others. This is how I replied to her:

Spirit of Adventure: 
Wildland Adventures are physical, intellectual and spiritual adventures versus a physically risky or arduous challenge. The real adventure comes from new insights, experiencing the awe found in nature, encounters with local cultures, and the excitement of personal discovery that we strive to build into every itinerary and encourage in the spirit of every traveler. We know that creating indelible bonds, breaking down barriers that separate and divide, and facilitating situations where travelers can feel part of a local community or family creates the true adventure found in every Wildland journey.

In between their Kenya safari adventures Wildland travelers, Jeff and Jane Zimmerman, pose with two students in front of the school where they contributed a computer lab and other facilities for a remote village. 

Sustainability:
Wildland Adventures was founded on the principle that culturally and environmentally responsible travel can be a powerful force for change. I founded the Travelers Conservation Trust (TCT) in 1986 by as a non-profit, affiliate program of Wildland Adventures that allows our travelers to support local conservation initiatives and small-scale community development projects. We carefully select the partners we work with based on their commitment to conservation and sustainable operations.

Discovery and Learning: 
The direct involvement of our professional local guides in helping to develop and lead Wildland Adventures ensures our guests have an exceptionally informed, well-executed, and authentic experience. The most important aspect of discovery and learning is to participate in the actual daily lives of people in the cultures and destinations we visit rather than simply traveling through them. Therefore, we carefully design these interactive personal experiences into our itineraries for meaningful interactions with local people of all different walks of life including home stays and meals in local homes, spiritual and religious ceremonies, harvest and cooking opportunities, and participating in local initiatives like women's co-ops and community-based cultural programs that introduce travelers to local lifestyles. We also train our local guides to look for spontaneous cultural encounters for guests to interact in typical daily life events. Furthermore, by traveling with greater sensitivity as conscientious travelers we not only provide an alternative to exploitative and destructive aspects of tourism, but we also strive to share more sustainable lifestyles with our travelers that we can all adapt in our own way of life back home.

A Wildland Adventures group participates in a "Pago a la Tierra" ceremony with a Quechua shaman in the Urubamba Valley blessing our good fortune before starting the Inca Trail Trek on our Peru adventure. 

Customer Service and Satisfaction:
At Wildland Adventures, our highest priorities are sincerity, good faith and genuineness - they're all part of the ethic we embrace in approaching our world and the people and cultures we share it with. Our high degree of repeat travelers is testament to our personal attention to details and responsiveness to resolving problems or service-related issues when they arise, as they inevitably do in adventure travel. Our Code of Ethics for Nature and Culture Travelers, provided to all travelers, exemplifies how we design and conduct our trips to create opportunities for authentic, meaningful and beneficial cross-cultural interactions between hosts and guests.

Our Wildland group of mostly alumni travelers poses with our trekking crew and staff celebrating our good fortune after completing the Inca Trail Trek in Peru.

Learn more about our different travel styles for boomers, as well as family vacations and multi-generational travel, honeymoon adventures and romantic getaways, adventure cruises, and custom travel services.

Keeping it wild,

Kurt Kutay
Part 1