When guests ask me what to do with a fine day without heading back to the beach again, I nearly always give the same answer: go and see the vineyards. From the reception desk at the Hotel Noucentista I point inland, barely further than the line of hills. The Penedès, one of the great wine regions of Catalonia, begins a few minutes from Sitges. You can drive, but I often suggest the train: services to Sant Sadurní d’Anoia and Vilafranca del Penedès are frequent, the journey takes a little over an hour, and nobody has to decide who stays sober at the wheel.
What I like about this region is how down to earth and generous it stays. We are not talking about estates you cannot get into, but about family cellars and large houses open to the public, where you walk between the rows, go down into cool cellars and leave with a few bottles under your arm. Three white grapes give the Penedès its soul: xarel·lo, fleshy and slightly herbal, macabeu, all freshness, and parellada, finer and more floral. Blended together, they form the base of cava, the Catalan sparkling wine made by the traditional method, with a second fermentation in the bottle.
Sant Sadurní d’Anoia, the Capital of Cava
If you only remember one name, make it this one. Sant Sadurní d’Anoia is home to more than eighty cava producers and is reached directly by train from Sitges, with no car and no stress. Several houses open their doors to visitors. The best known, Freixenet, right in the centre of town, takes you through striking underground galleries where millions of bottles age in the half-light. For something more intimate, the family cellar Recaredo, founded in 1924, still does the riddling and disgorging entirely by hand, a skill that has become rare, and serves its tastings with local charcuterie. Some visits carry on with a walk through the vines, and every autumn the Phylloxera Festival brings the whole town to life. I recommend booking ahead, especially at weekends, and keeping the morning free: nobody hurries inside a cellar.
Vilafranca del Penedès and the Vinseum
A little further along the same line, Vilafranca del Penedès is the historic capital of the region. It is a proper small town, with its squares, its terraces and its market, where wine is part of daily life rather than of folklore. I mainly send there the curious ones who want to understand before they taste: the Vinseum, the museum of the wine cultures of Catalonia, tells centuries of winegrowing history, from Roman amphorae to great presses, and can be seen at an easy pace in an hour or two. Around the town, plenty of cellars welcome visitors for tastings of still wines, red as well as white. It is also a chance for a good lunch: the Penedès lends itself wonderfully to food and wine pairings, and back in Sitges I happily point people towards the best restaurants in Sitges to keep the pleasure going over a plate of fish.
The Malvasia de Sitges, a Treasure Saved by a Hospital
There is one wine I speak about with particular fondness, because it was born here, on our slopes facing the sea: the Malvasia de Sitges, a sweet amber wine with aromas of candied fruit and flowers, long poured for special occasions. Its story is a rescue. When this fragile grape came close to disappearing, the vines of the Foundation of the Sant Joan Baptista hospital, the oldest institution in town, gave it shelter; to this day, the income from the wine helps fund the care home run by the foundation. To grasp all of it without even leaving Sitges, the Malvasia Interpretation Centre, opened in 2021 in the medieval farmhouse of Can Milà at the entrance to town, offers a sensory trail and tastings. I love the idea that one glass can tell the past of our small town and serve the living at the same time.
Let Us Plan Your Day Among the Vines
The great advantage of Sitges is being able to spend the day among the vines and come back in the evening to have dinner facing the sea. There is no need to move from one estate to the next: you keep your base by the water and travel out from there. Many of our guests set off in the morning towards Sant Sadurní or Vilafranca, take in one or two visits, have lunch there, then come back to settle on a terrace. Bring water, good shoes for walking between the rows, and leave a little room in your suitcase. And above all, do come and see me at reception: I will be delighted to help you put your wine escape together, to choose the cellars that match your taste and your timings, and to check the train connections. People rarely come back from the Penedès empty-handed, and that is just as it should be.
