The world’s best wine regions seem to all have active wine tourism along established wine routes. There’s a kind of reinforcement that happens for serious wine lovers when they step foot inside the spots whose wines they love.

While Israel has been producing wine off and on for thousands of years, and today is home to more than 200 wineries, Israel is still an infant I think when it comes to having anything anywhere near an “established” wine route and wine tourism industry. For instance, and I know this will sound silly but the winery signage (is that a word?) in Israel mostly stinks – and by that I mean there is largely none. This has really got to change fast…and seems like a simple quick-fix way to begin to mark a literal wine route for tourists.

A handful of hip entrepreneurs have decided to do something about that, combining their love for Israel and of wine into start-ups focused on taking visitors behind the scenes into the Original Wine World.

For many of them, I feel, it’s their way of broadening people’s understanding of what Israel is all about.

I recently held a Skype conference with one of these cutting-edge folks, Esther Cohen. We talked about aliyah, her love of wine,her plans for her growing company, My Israel Wine Tours, and how our companies might work together, connecting the dots between her on-site touring activities there in Israel with access to Israeli wines here in the US from my warehouse upon visitors’ returns. In the meantime, I want readers of my blog to enjoy the Israeli wine world through her on-site eyes!

So we agreed Esther will write a series of guest posts on my blog, bringing to life the Israeli wine scene through pictures and stories.

What follows is her introductory guest post.

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One hundred and twenty-five years ago Edmond Baron De Rothschild founded the Carmel Mizrahi Winery and through his influence and vision, today Israel is a thriving wine country.  Two years ago when I made Aliyah I wanted to make a positive impact in Israeli society and contribute economically through improving an aspect of Israel.  However, I was not sure how I was going to accomplish this mission.

After completing Ulpan in Jerusalem, I decided to move up North to improve my Hebrew and learn about the Israeli Wine Industry.  Just as Rothschild saw promise in the immigrants from the First Aliyah, so too did Jonathan Tishbi, the grandson of the first settlers in Zichron Yaakov, see potential in my venture to learn about the Israeli wine industry.

I started out waitressing, then moved up as an English tour guide and then to co-managing the Tishbi Winery Visitors Center.  After a year of touring groups around the Tishbi Winery I finally found my niche combining both the Israeli Wine and tourism industries.

Israel calls herself a wine country and has 200 wineries throughout five regions, but the tourism around the wine industry is lacking because it is so new and people come to Israel for her history, religion, and archeology, not wine, but that has changed in the last 10 years.

I founded My Israel Wine Tours in January 2010 as a way to create and organize wine tours around Israel.  My tours consist of meeting the winemakers, exploring the vineyards, tasting delicious food, and drinking a variety of wines.

Usually I am the one touring the group, but yesterday I got a chance to tour the vineyards and other wineries of the Golan Heights with Danny Maor, owner of Maor Winery.  Danny explained that even though the Golan Heights is a Plateau the altitude differs greatly throughout. In the Northern Golan the volcanic soil is airy, cold and 1200 meters in altitude with snow in the winter. The volcanic soil in the Central Golan is like cement and the altitude is approximately 600 meters. In the Southern Golan the volcanic soil is rocky and the altitude is 450 meters. The altitude in the Golan Heights also rises from East to West and in the Northern Golan there are hills throughout that give the vineyards different wind-patterns and amounts of water which has many different affects on the final product.

Danny Maor owns 30 dumans of vineyards in the Telfaris vineyards near the most Western boarder of Israel, near Syria. His vineyards are organic and have the volcanic cement like soil.  His vineyards consist of 15% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Syrah and 2% Petit Verdo. Maor predicts that in the next 10 years the Golan Heights is going to resemble Bordeaux with different sub-regions that hold stature and fame. The wines will not be called by the name of their variety but by the terrior that they were cultivated.

Yesterday we also visited Assaf Winery; with a production of 35,000 Assaf produces some of the most award winning wines in Israel. Bashan Winery is an organic kosher winery in the Southern Golan.

Each bottle of wine tells an intimate story. Join My Israel Wine Tours to see, hear and taste the flavors of Israel in a timely and timeless way! www.myisraelwinetours.com or contact Esther Cohen atMyIsraelWineTours@gmail.com.

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