The Algarve's wine renaissance began not in Lagos but in the limestone hills forty kilometres inland, where Phoenician amphorae and Roman pressing stones mark two millennia of viticulture. By the eighteenth century the region supplied fortified wine to Lisbon and the Atlantic trade, yet phylloxera and urbanisation nearly erased its vineyards. In 2001 the Algarve was granted Denominação de Origem Controlada status, and a generation of vignerons returned to the schist slopes above Silves and Lagoa, replanting Negra Mole, Castelão, and Aragonez alongside experimental Syrah and Touriga Nacional. Today fifteen estates operate tasting rooms within an hour's drive of Lagos, most occupying renovated quintas where terracotta fermentation jars still line cool cellars. A wine tour from Lagos typically departs mid-morning, threading north through cork oak and carob groves toward the Serra de Monchique or east along the N125 to the Lagoa plateau. The route passes whitewashed villages where cooperative presses once handled smallholder harvests, now restored as cultural centres. Most tours anchor at a family-run estate — Quinta dos Vales near Estômbar, Morgado do Reguengo in Porches, or Adega do Cantor in Guia — where guided walks through vine rows precede seated tastings of four to six labels. The estates favour low-intervention winemaking: native yeast fermentation, minimal sulphur, ageing in French oak or concrete tanks. Tasting notes emphasise minerality drawn from calcareous soils and the Atlantic influence that tempers summer heat, producing wines with brighter acidity than those of the Douro or Alentejo. Many wine tours from Lagos pair viticulture with regional gastronomy, serving petiscos — sardine conservas, presunto, queijo de Azeitão, marinated olives — alongside the pour. Some itineraries extend to Silves, where the medieval castle overlooks terraced vineyards, or climb into Monchique's eucalyptus forests to visit artisan aguardente distilleries. The longest excursions incorporate a second estate, allowing comparison between coastal and mountain microclimates. Harvest season, late August through October, sees working tours where participants press grapes by foot in granite lagares, though these require advance reservation. The Algarve wine route remains undervisited compared to Porto's lodges or the Douro Valley's quintas, yet its proximity to Lagos and the clarity of its terroir narratives have made vineyard excursions a fixture of the town's cultural offerings since the mid-2010s.