A Winemakers Village: St Emilion

After a beautiful sleep in our four poster bed (I don't think the mattress was original) we woke to the noise of a peacock and delicious pastries delivered to our door. The high calory count was to benefit us as we roamed the steep and unevenly cobbled streets of Saint Emilion.
However before commencing our exploration of St Emilion we had a tour of the veneyard of Chateau Lescours, where we are staying and tasted their wines. Ludovic, the winemaker, took us on a walk around the 8 hectares that make up this vineyard explaining things such as how the vines are pruned in different directions each year and the rules and regulations of this region. We then were shown through the winery. He uses mainly concrete vats to ferment before putting 50% into barrels. We then tried some lovely grand cru wines. How special to stay in a chateau on a winery in one of the premier wine regions of the world. After our tasting we wended our way up the narrow country roads, past other winery chateaux to St Ellion. It was already lunchtime and after a foggy cold morning the sun came out and we stripped off the layers as we lunched in the centre of the town. I have to say that while the photo looks fab and the location was great most of the food was a disappointment with the duck hearts being overcooked and leathery, the squid unpleasant and while the first couple of mouthfuls of foie gras were kind of ok, it proved way too rich and fatty for me and I felt quite yuck after. The duck croquets and salmon blinis were nice though. And the wine was just fine thank you very much
We had downloaded an app that took us on a tour of the town collecting info along the way. This was an interesting way to do it as it took us outside the town gates and around some of the perimeter as well taking in roads that are less commonly visited by tourists. It was a little frustrating navigating around until I took over the navigation (this has been a theme in our relationship of traveling together). However things went smoothly from that point and we took in some lovely views and historic sites as we helped the winemaker from the app find out that while in the past the jurade decided on the harvest dates this rule had been abolished and winemakers are now able to decide for themselves when to harvest.
After a brief rest at our Chateau we returned to St Emilion for a fantastic meal at Chai Pascal, probably our best in France so far!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bon jour France 🇫🇷

Image
 Well, here we are in France after months of planning and anticipation. After a somewhat bumpy journey due to turbulence we stumbled off the plane early in the morning and nervously got into our rental car to navigate driving on the right hand side of the road while jet lagged.  We had planned a few things to do on the way to our hotel as we couldn’t check in until 3pm.  First on the list was to explore Auvers sur Oise, the small town where Van Gogh died.  The Chateau d’Auverse sur Oise was having an exhibition about him, with some of his original paintings displayed. I was especially pleased that one of the paintings was sunflowers as in my art paper at teachers college we had done crayon pictures of sunflowers inspired by Van Gogh’s paintings. My brain was a bit woolly from jet lag so I don’t remember much detail from the exhibition but it was an enjoyable way to spend an hour or so. Chateau d’Auverse sur Oise After a stroll around the gardens we found a cafe in th...
Read more

The Magnificent Mount St Michel

Image
We were away to an early start to drive to Mont St Michel on our way to the Loire Valley in the hope of beating the crowds. Arriving just on opening time the early start certainly paid off as we did not have to queue to get into the Abbey. What a stunning sight as we drove along the country roads approaching the Mount. I have seen pictures but seeing the reality was quite different. A shuttle bus took us from the parking along a bridge to a point close to the mount and it was a short walk from the drop off point to the entry. The view only got more spectacular as we got closer. I can't imagine how they built such an immense Abbey on top of such a small island and got all the materials required transported there. The narrow street up to the Abbey is not wide enough for a car and is quite steep. It is lined with souvenier shops and eateries designed to woo even more euro away from the tourists but quite pretty. Already feeling breathless we arrived at the foot of steep stairs takin...
Read more

A day in Rouen

Image
The day began with a challenge when, on researching where to park, we discovered that to drive into Rouen we would need a sticker on our car showing we had paid an emissions tax. This can only be purchased in advance and is posted to you and our rental car did not have one attached. After some minor panicking we did a bit of research into park and ride options, then had a brainwave and decided to take a train from the village near our hotel and pick up the car at the days end. Feeling proud of our flexibility we packed up and set off. Imagine our dismay when we missed the train by two minutes and found the next one was two hours later! Rising to the challenge we amended our plans again and drove to the park and ride location. This turned out to be easy and convenient, a lot less stressful than driving into the city and trying to navigate narrow one way systems and to find parking - and was also cheaper than parking in the city. Lesson learned. Rouen is a beautiful city and the place ...
Read more