Maximiliano Morales
Maximiliano Morales is an agricultural engineer and specialist in Chilean and Argentine wines. Since 1998, he has worked as an English-speaking tour guide in wine-focused destinations, organizing tastings and tailor-made wine trips throughout Chile—from its flowering deserts to its mountains and forests, and in Torres del Paine National Park.
He has also become one of the most recognized wine-marketing consultants in South America for his skillful development of wine-based tourism and has worked as a strategic consultant to the Chilean government’s economic development agency to create a road map for the Chilean wine industry that addresses the challenges posed by climate change.
Maximiliano specializes in seeking out old vines along the 4,000 kilometers of wine valleys from the north to the south of Chile. He rescues old-vine projects to produce wines from vinestocks brought by European immigrants dating back to the arrival of the Spanish in 1550.
Aboard Lindblad’s expeditions, he chooses wines from vintners along National Geographic Explorer’s route in the region and has served as the wine specialist aboard the National Geographic Endeavour, which navigates the Galápagos archipelago. Maximiliano has also written about wine and travel for numerous media outlets.