Moldova
Cricova
Underground streets named after grape varieties in a subterranean city where Gagarin once lost two days.
The street signs read Cabernet, Chardonnay, Aligote — an entire underground city where every address is a grape variety. Electric vehicles hum through chalk tunnels that stay cool enough to see your breath, past barrel rooms that stretch further than the headlights reach. Somewhere in these corridors, Yuri Gagarin once spent two days and emerged reluctantly.
Cricova is a subterranean wine city carved from former limestone mines just north of Chișinău, Moldova's capital. Its tunnels extend over 120 kilometres, with named streets, traffic roundabouts, and tasting rooms built into the chalk walls. The cellar has hosted heads of state and cosmonauts since the Soviet era — its VIP collection holds bottles belonging to foreign leaders, some never intended to be opened. Guided tours travel by electric vehicle through galleries maintained at a constant temperature, passing sparkling wines made using the méthode traditionnelle since the 1950s. Subterranean dining halls serve multi-course Moldovan feasts with wines drawn directly from surrounding barrels. Unlike its larger neighbour Mileștii Mici, Cricova leans into spectacle — the experience is as much about the theatre of the underground city as the wine itself.
Solo
Cricova's guided tours are well-structured for independent visitors. The combination of wine tasting, Cold War history, and sheer subterranean scale gives you enough material for a full afternoon without needing company.
Couple
The underground dining halls — long tables, candlelight, wines poured from barrels ageing in the walls around you — make for an evening that feels ceremonial. Sharing a bottle from the year you met is a Cricova speciality.
Friends
A group rolling through an underground city by electric vehicle, stopping at tasting bays and toasting with Soviet-era sparkling wine, is the kind of absurd luxury that makes a trip legendary among friends.
Family
Children are genuinely fascinated by the underground streets with grape-variety names and the electric vehicle tour. The scale and novelty hold attention in a way that traditional wine tours rarely manage with younger visitors.
- Yuri Gagarin reportedly stayed in Cricova's underground dining halls for two days during a 1966 visit — the cellars have hosted heads of state and cosmonauts since.
- Streets bear names like Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Aligote — a subterranean city with addresses based entirely on grape variety.
- Guided tours travel by electric vehicle through chalk tunnels where temperature never rises above 12°C regardless of the season above.
- The cellar holds a VIP collection including bottles belonging to foreign heads of state — some of which will never be opened.
Barrel-room tastings of sparkling wine made in the méthode traditionnelle since Soviet times.
Subterranean dining halls serving multi-course Moldovan feasts with wines aged in the surrounding tunnels.
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