France Just Opened a Wine Theme Park

Travel News France

Last week, Shanghai Disneyland opened its doors for the first time. Due to the months of anticipation surrounding the resort’s opening, as well as the $5.5 billion dollar price tag attached to its construction, information about any other new amusement parks has seemingly slipped into the summer entirely under the radar.

This timing is especially unfortunate for La Cité du Vin, France’s new, entirely wine-based theme park. Officially opened at the beginning of the June, the resort’s name translates to “City of Wine” in English—and the description couldn’t be more accurate.

The park, which is fittingly located in France’s Bordeaux wine country, offers a all of the thrills and amenities of a legitimate amusement park, except with every attraction geared toward wine history, wine education and of course wine tasting. La Cité du Vin is something out of a wine lover’s wildest dreams—the 10-story, $91 million property offers a restaurant, a tapas bar and even a simulator boat ride that tours guests through the history of maritime wine trading.

There’s even an in-house boutique shop that sells bottles of trending wines as well as wine-related books, games and supplies, featuring products from 80 different countries.

Of course, a resort of this magnitude would be nothing without some high-quality tastings. The theme park offers a slew of rotating expert-guided tasting sessions and workshops, as well as a constant “”permanent tour that features a 3D, fully immersive exploration through 20 different themed areas.

Of course it probably isn’t recommended that visitors try to travel too far after spending a day at La Cité du Vin, and there are tons of hotels in the area—including La Grande Maison de Bernard Magrez, an extravagant mansion-turned wine-themed hotel. The hotel is only two miles away, meaning true wine fanatics can easily plan the weekend of a lifetime between the two destinations.

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