mjs

I often take California wines as gifts to friends in Europe. There are many excellent wines being produced in California and my friends seem to enjoy them. Paso Robles has some excellent wineries such as Saxum, Alban and Sine Qua Non. Napa and Sonoma have too many to count. Alcohol levels if you are sensitive to them tend to vary with varietal and location and years. The top recent Bordeaux vintages of 2005, 2009 and 2010 have been running in the 13.5-15% alcohol levels which are not much different from the alcohol levels of Cal cabs. Just a few minutes ago I purchased two cases of 2012 Bordeaux which also have alcohol levels in the 14-14.5% region.
I too use Wine skins to pack my bottles and use 2 gallon zip lock bags for additional protection. Rarely find deals for wines in Europe as I usually can find them for less or same in the US. There are however exceptions as I have scored deals for Pavie in France, Alion and Numanthia in Spain and Solaia in Italy. As there are 4 in my family I usually bring back about 6 bottles if I find something interesting. I am however under threat of huge costs to replace clothes if any of the bottles break.

NewbE

<Rarely find deals for wines in Europe as I usually can find them for less or same in the US. >
This raises an excellent point for the OP to consider. Nothing beats the romance of bringing home a few special bottles of wine you enjoyed in France, but a casual knowledge of prices for the same quality French wines in the US will save you from buying a case or more for too much money.

(And thanks to the French classification system, quality can actually be determined, to some extent--taste is always subjective, of course!)

Mamma_Love

I plan to bring a 12 bottle shipping box with appropriate inserts and check the whole thing on my return. These could probably be obtained where you buy wine during your trip too.

FYI: I put a bottle of wine in a wine skin and rolled it down a metal staircase to pavement below to test it once! No breakage, no leakage, the bottle was totally fine. It was a fun experiment.

Tibor08

I don't think is worth it, just drink it and you have a good memory

GerryBonj

We find that the wines we buy in France are cheaper than in the states. Also some are not available in the states. We usually bring 5 or 6 bottles which we declare and have never been asked by customs to pay anything, though I suppose there might be a chance. Last trip shipped a case from Bordeaux for 92 dollars to Indiana.

Kathie

My experience also is that I can often buy French wines for less in France than I can in the US. And I often find wines that I like that are not imported to the US.

travelgourmet

<i>For a larger quantity of wine they have the Wine Check rolling transport case for 12 or 15 bottles that you can check like any other luggage.</i>

The Wine Check only holds 12 bottles. And 12 bottles comes in right around 45 pounds or so. Going up to 15 bottles would likely push you over the standard weight limit. That being said, the Wine Check is a great product.

<i>We usually bring 5 or 6 bottles which we declare and have never been asked by customs to pay anything, though I suppose there might be a chance.</i>

I always declare and have never had to pay anything. Once, coming back from Australia with 2 cases, the customs guy started calculating the duty, got bored, and waived me through without paying. Even if you did have to pay duty (and excise), it is really low - like a buck or two per liter (sparkling and fortified is marginally more), so if it were going to be make or break, the wine is too cheap to bother bringing back.

The only thing to bear in mind might be any state laws about importing wine. Utah, for example, limits you to two liters, while California allows 5 cases per person. I'm guessing that, aside from Utah, this will be a non-issue for most people, but I've heard horror stories about Utah enforcing their rules.