A Whole Day at a Museum in Bordeaux -Believe It, or Not

Who would have thought we would spend 5 hours in one museum? Certainly not me! On the advice of our host we took the train to Bourdeaux rather than driving in. Great decision as she drove into the city that day and took 2.5 hours due to traffic delays while we zipped in and took half an hour. We got off before the main station as the walk to the Cite du Vin (wine museum) was shorter although our walk took us through an industrial area. We had to cross the river across a huge bridge the centre of which rises up to allow big ships to pass under. We did not get to see this feat of engineering working unfortunately but it must be a spectacle when it does happen. Later we got to see the bridge from above in the belvedere of the Cite du Vin.
The Cite du Vin is an experiential museum of wine - maybe it doesn't surprise some of our friends that we spent a long time here. There were innovative displays showing the history of wine in different cultures, how it is made and experienced. We both enjoyed sniffing the aromas and guessing what they were.
We also booked a tasting class and spent just over an hour being taken through the finer points of tasting wine. While we have done quite a lot of wine tasting in our time this was interesting and informative. I found the colour wheel of possible aromas helpful in thinking about the characteristics of each wine and we both practised sucking air over our wine. There may have a dribbles and coughs before we perfected this technique (and maybe we haven't quite got it down pat yet. We had expected the 3 wines we tasted to be from the Boudeaux region but the sommelier played tricks on us. We had two chardonnays, one from Burgundy and one from South Africa. They were both very different from an NZ one. The third wine was called Rubin from Bulgaria and a mix of Syrah and Nebbiolo. Interesting!
Our visit to the museum concluded with a trip up to the 8th floor belvedere where we could choose a glass of wine (included in entry price) to enjoy as we took in the scenic views over the city. The building itself is spectacular being designed to have the shape od a wine decanter.
Time to put into practise our skills in navigating the purchase of tickets for public transport and we successfully navigated a tram ride to the centre of Bourdeax in an attempt to see the water mirror which reflects the Place de la Bourse. Disappointingly this was not working when we were there, we did check the timing and waited what would seem to be long enough for it's cycle but no joy. The river front is very bustling with walkers, cyclists and people on scooters. We decided we were too tired to fully explore the city so took in the lovely views of the fountain and grand buildings lining the river front and jumped back on the tram just in time to get to the train station before our tram tickets expired (they last an hour). It was 7.30 by the time we returned and we were pretty tired so we picked up cheese and baguette and enjoyed a simple dinner with a bottle of bubbles we had purchased at a vineyard in Loire. Lovely evening in the sunshine.

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