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Mastermind, Cooking, Wine & Walking Tour
in Tuscany's Brunello &
Vino Nobile Wine Country
for Women Business Owners
idyllic Tuscan countryside at Sant'Antimo church near Montalcino
Mastermind Cooking Tour Content
Where in Tuscany?
Tour Manager & Facilitator
Italian Cooking Classes
Wine Tastings
Accommodation in four star villa
Mastermind Cooking
Tour Itinerary
Tour Dates
Tour Price
To Reserve
Tuscany Cooking
Tour Comments
Mastermind Vancouver Session Comments
Mastermind, Cooking
& Wine Tour: Brief Description
What: a six day cooking, wine and walking tour based at a beautiful four star villa in Tuscany with
four mastermind sessions in getting your business into the media, marketing, increasing sales and overcoming your biggest business challenge.
Learn from fellow women business owners' experiences and get new ideas so you grow your business faster. Enjoy Tuscan pleasures like discovering cooking secrets with chefs in their kitchens, tasting top wines with the producers, sitting for ages at tables savouring fresh, local dishes, exploring and shopping in pretty, medieval hill towns, walking in the country of olive trees and vineyards.
Laugh and have fun with your new friends and lots of Tuscan characters! Go home relaxed, refreshed and re-energized with renewed passion for your business!
When: September 26 to October 2, 2007 for seven women business owners in different fields.
Tour manager & group facilitator: Margaret Cowan, M. Ed., aka "Mama Margaret". Tour Content: Sharing Business Successes & Mistakes in a Mastermind Group and Cooking, Wine, Dining and Fun...
In four mastermind sessions, women business owners will share their successes and mistakes in public relations, marketing, increasing sales, and brainstorm on their biggest business challenges.
Learn from your peers' business experiences of what works and what to avoid so you grow your business faster and go home with lots of new ideas.
Far away from busy, fast paced life at home and cooking, eating, laughing, walking, shopping and drinking wine in Tuscany with your peers is an ideal environment for your creativity to soar and new business strategies to hatch.
Author Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach says, "the more free time entrepreneurs take, the better their results." He urges business owners to take many vacations to get many breakthroughs. |
good friends enjoy their
cooking class creations |
Each woman will represent a different type of business so the group will benefit from the widest range of experiences and knowledge bases possible.
As Jack Canfield says about mastermind groups in his book, "Success Principles", ".we all tend to get stuck in our own field of expertise.when you assemble people from different industries, you get lots of different perspectives on the same subject."
Each woman must bring her stories of successes and mistakes in her business to share, and a business challenge she wants help with. No stories, no content!
With the mornings' food for thought in mind, your sharing, networking and making new contacts continues in the afternoons and evenings on your cooking, wine and walking tour in Tuscany. Please see the delicious details below.
After your sojourn in Tuscany with us, you'll go home relaxed, refreshed and re-energized with renewed passion for your business! And new friends, contacts or mentors too! |
good friends bond making pasta |
Tour Manager & Group Facilitator: Margaret Cowan, M. Ed., aka "Mama Margaret"
Before owning her tour company, Margaret taught and created English as a Second Language and job training programs for adult immigrants for nine years. She's led many cooking tours, knows lots about Italy and has a good sense of humour, so you'll learn lots and laugh lots! She looks after everything, so you just sit back and have fun!
She ran mastermind sessions on public relations and marketing for women business owners in Vancouver with great success in the spring of 2007. Get inspired by their comments below!
Where?
Lovely Countryside and Medieval Walled Hill Towns
About one hour south of Siena, you'll explore the lovely hill
towns of Montalcino, Pienza and Montepulciano. As you stroll
along narrow streets or quiet country roads, the vast, dramatic
vistas of rolling hills--velvety green, gold or brown fields,
with olive trees, hay and vineyards--will make you feel peaceful.
Walks are optional. You'll
enjoy getting to know a long list of Tuscans
in their kitchens, on their farms, in their wine cellars--people
you'd never meet otherwise in places you'd never have found
on your own. You'll feel Italian for a week, immersed in genuine
local life.
You'll visit an idyllic Tuscan valley and Sant'Antimo,
one of Italy's most beautiful Romanesque churches, that turns
gold inside and out when the sun hits. It stands on flat land
where two hillsides meet in a classic Tuscan landscape--a
patchwork quilt of olive groves, combed fields in rich brown
or gold, vineyards and dark green forests, with cypresses
zigzagging up country roads. Sit down on the grass, immerse
yourself in all the beauty and get really peaceful inside.
In
the medieval hilltown of Montalcino, Italy, famous
for Brunello wine, you can stroll the narrow streets, stop
at Italian wine, honey and gastronomy stores, or outdoor cafes,
or sip some Brunello at the medieval fortress, now an enoteca.
Fabulous 360 degree views! Pictures of Montalcino.
Pienza,
Italy sits on a hill with sweeping views over the vast
Val d'Orcia with undulating fields dotted with olive groves
and farmhouses leading up to Monte Amiata. A sunny walkway
with marvellous panoramas takes you along one side of town
past the Street of Fortune, Street of Kisses. Pienza is famous
for its pecorino cheese. Pictures of Pienza.
The larger hilltown of Montepulciano, Italy is renowned for its Vino Nobile di Montepulciano wine. Its narrow streets and beautiful piazzas are lined with distinguished Italian Renaissance palazzos, wine cellars with 13th century grottoes, gastronomy shops, cafes and wine stores. From several lookout points, you can admire fantastic panoramas all around. Pictures of Montepulciano
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Montepulciano from a country road on our walk |
Cooking
classes with restaurant chef and great home cook in their
kitchens: learn lots of cooking secrets in two kitchens
In your two cooking lessons, you'll learn two Italian chefs' secrets cooking right beside them in their restaurant and farm kitchens.
Cook with very knowledgeable, creative, charming Chef Roberto, born in the mountains nearby and owns a restaurant famous for mushroom dishes in a mountain hamlet. People drive for miles to eat there.
Roberto is passionate about bringing back traditional Tuscan dishes with little modern touches--porcini mushroom soup, local pici pasta with ragu, slices of grilled beef with arugola, wild boar with olives or chocolate (!), pears stuffed with lemon custard with chocolate sauce on top. Mmmm...! A feast for your tastebuds! |
cooking class at Chef Roberto's restaurant |
Cook
with exuberant Sandra on her family's farm
on a beautiful ridge between two valleys, where she and husband,
Ulisses make pecorino cheese, preserve their vegetables and fruit, make wine, have many animals, herb gardens, farm volunteers. They're wonderful cooks and export their pasta. A very entrepreneurial couple who left Switzerland 15 years ago and took up farming with their six children.
What a
variety of people, places, restaurants,
food and wine to experience!
Taste
Brunello and Vino Nobile wines at wineries and wine cellars...with
the owners
In
the Brunello wine country in Montalcino, you visit a Brunello winery in the country with the very hospitable
owner. He shows you their winery, explains how they make their wines and tastes their Brunello
and Rosso di Montalcino with you.
wine tasting with winery owner, Vittorio Innocenti in his cellars in Montefollonico
In the Vino Nobile wine country in Montepulciano, with the
philosopher owner you visit a wine cellar in a 14th century palazzo with
panoramic garden terrace in a pristine, pretty hill town of Montefollonico. Taste his great Vino Nobile, rosso di Montepulciano,
Vin Santo.
Lovely, Historic Four Star Villa
Escape to a lovely four star villa with 12 rooms, dating back to the Middle Ages when noble families owned it.
This beautifully restored home is professionally decorated in period style with some antique furniture, some frescoes, and many refined touches in all the rooms. It sits about two km outside Montepulciano with spectacular views across the valley--hills of vineyards, olive trees, golden grain fields and forests.
The house is set among pretty gardens and olive trees which extend out around the swimming pool, jacuzzi and patios which have great panoramas.
Accommodation pictures |
four star villa hotel in the
country near Montepulciano
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Itinerary
long time friends enjoying a wonderful dinner
and wine in Tuscan restaurant
Day 1
Our driver and Mama Margaret pick the group up at the Chiusi train station, half way between Florence and Rome.
Arrive at your four star villa hotel near the wine country hill town of Montepulciano.
Welcome dinner at the villa restaurant.
Day 2
Breakfast buffet at the villa.
9:30/10:00 to 12:30 Mastermind session on successes and mistakes in marketing. The villa restaurant will be our meeting room.
Drive into Montepulciano (one mile) for a light lunch on your own (not included).
Guided walk in Montepulciano, a medieval, walled town famous for Vino Nobile with lovely views, handsome Renaissance palaces, wine cellars, and good shops.
In Montepulciano a Vino Nobile, Rosso di Montepulciano, Vin Santo wine tasting with a family wine producer in their ancient grotto where their wine ages.
Free time to walk, shop or hang out in the piazza or go back to the villa.
7:00 Drive to little medieval hill town, Pienza for dinner at one of our favourite trattorias.
Day 3
Breakfast.
9:30/10:00 to 12:30 Mastermind session on successes and mistakes in public relations.
Drive back to Pienza for light lunch on your own (not included).
Guided walk in little Pienza famous for pecorino cheese.
Free time. Shop, walk on country roads with incredible views.
4:00 p.m. Drive to Sandra and Ulisses' farm for a full menu cooking lesson. Visit the farm.
Dinner of your creations at the farm.
Day 4
Breakfast. A break from workshops today.
Drive about one hour to a mountain hamlet to Roberto's restaurant for a full menu cooking lesson. Roberto is a chef, passionate about his work, very hospitable and knowledgeable.
Olive oil tasting with Roberto who is exporting his special olive oil abroad.
Full menu lunch of your creations.
Drive back down to wine country to Sant'Antimo church, a magnificent, 1000 year old, Romanesque building set in an idyllic valley of cypresses zigzagging up the hill, vineyards, olive groves and fields. Peace and beauty seeps into you there.
Visit a Brunello winery of a welcoming family in the country nearby for tour and tasting.
Drive to Montalcino, a hill town famous for Brunello, one of Italy's top reds. Guided walk in Montalcino.
Very light dinner on your own in Montalcino (not included). After your big lunch at Roberto's, you'll only want a snack. Montalcino has some good wine bars perfect for light meals.
Day 5
Breakfast.
9:30 to 12:30 Mastermind session on successes and mistakes in increasing sales.
Light lunch in Montepulciano on your own (not included).
Free time in Montepulciano to shop, explore or hang out in the piazza with a drink.
6:30 p.m. Drive across the valley to small hill town, Montefollonico to visit Vino Nobile winery in a 14 th century palazzo. If good weather, tasting is in the garden on the terrace with marvellous views across the valley to Montepulciano. If cool weather, tasting is in a tasting room in the wine cellar where a wine perfume permeates all the walls.
8:00 pm. Dinner at a very good restaurant in Montefollonico, owned by a feisty single mother. Perhaps Patrizia will have time to tell us some of her success stories.
Day 6
Breakfast.
9:30?10:00 to 12:30 Session on brainstorming solutions for business challenges each group member needs help with.
Light lunch at the villa (included)
Free afternoon. Relax at the villa, go into Montepulciano, walk in the country.
8:00 p.m. Gala dinner at a small, elegant restaurant in Montepulciano, featuring Tuscan dishes with a creative flair.
Day 7
Breakfast and departure for Chiusi.
2007
Date
September 26-October 2.
2007
Price:
Prices are in Euros and are subject to the currency exchange
fluctuations.
2260 Euros per person (about $3525
CAD, $3005 US at current exchange rates ), double occupancy, land only. Single supplement 350 Euros (about $546 CAD, $465 US at current exchange rates).If you want a roommate, we will do our best to match you up.
VISA and Mastercard accepted
Includes:
• six nights accommodation at four star villa hotel with breakfast buffet
• private bus transport from Chiusi to villa, during the tour and from villa to Chiusi
• three mastermind sessions on public relations, marketing and sales successes and mistakes
• one brainstorming session on solving your big business challenge
• two full menu cooking lessons with full menu meal after
• one lunch & four dinners (non cooking class meals)
• three wine tastings
• visit to Sant'Antimo church
• guided walks in Montepulciano, Pienza, Montalcino
• services of full time tour manager, Margaret Cowan
• services of mastermind group facilitator, Margaret Cowan
Not included:
- wine with meals
- three lunches and one dinner
Tuscany Cooking Tour Comments:
a tour based at the same villa
custom Tuscany tours based at other hotels
Mastermind Vancouver Groups Women Business Owner Comments:
"I love all the ideas and practices other women business owners have. Even though they are in different businesses, I can adapt them for my business. I really like the way we all have different experiences and expertise. Margaret is energetic, speaks from the heart, humorous and makes everyone feel comfortable. The workshop was informal, friendly and non-threatening. It was really fun and I learned so much!"
Doris Jung, owner of four Automind Collision Centres
My biggest ah-ha was about making friends with the media and getting a professional photographer to take pictures and send them in. I liked hearing others' stories-so interesting. The workshop was very organized, carefully thought out. The facilitator was great. What a good idea!
Donna Peach, CEO, Digital Planet Technologies Inc.
The content was great. We shared invaluable secrets, everyone was very pro everyone winning and the brainstorming for each person gave us all ideas. The facilitator was personable and everything flowed. Lots of food for thought to follow up on. The food and wine were great. A superb evening!
Gwen Gnazdowsky, Life Coach Personal, Professional & Relationship
www.oneconversation.com To
Reserve: Contact Margaret Cowan at margaret@italycookingschools.com
or call 1-800-557-0370 within North America or 604-681-4074or
fax 604-681-4909.
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