A taste bud tour through French wine
PARIS
It was brilliant to spend 3-4 days exploring the typical Paris tourist sites, catching up with an old friend, admiring the brilliant fashion of (some) Parisians and finding genuinely cool pockets of the city. It definitely helped that we had 2 quite warm days which we loved after 4 months of bitterly cold weather.
REIMS
A fleeting visit to the champagne region we discovered the absolutely beautiful Reims Cathedral (with a rich history being the site where every French King between 1027 and 1825 was crowned). We also got introduced to actually delicious sparkling wine that you don’t have to pay an arm and a leg for!
STRASBOURG
This city captured our hearts. A unique and romantic city set on the boarder of France and Germany with a really interesting history and subsequent influences from both countries. The city had a great vibe and we once again scored gorgeous sunny weather with this attracting everyone out of their houses onto the riverbank to enjoy a beverage or two (or three or four). On that note, the Alsace region is known for its production of Riesling and we certainly tried some damn fine examples. Another real highlight here for us was having a delicious lunch at Restaurant Buerehiesel.... stunning food and setting! Would highly recommend this city to everyone!
BEAUNE
We next our way to the heart of the Burgundy wine region and stoped in Beaune. We went to an amazing winery and tasted 12 glorious examples of Burgundy Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays in the .. century cellar – very cool to be talking with a girl our age who is now working in the family business as her family have done for some … generations. It’s safe to say we didn’t leave empty handed! We found it extremely interesting to hear that often certain families/ estates only own just a few rows of vines in any given plot of land, rather different to most wineries in Australia where the family / estate owns the whole paddock. This is super interesting as the nuances in the wines being produced then genuinely come from the winemaking itself … and the TLC of course.
BEAUJOLAIS / LYON
After trying some mind blowing wines we treated our taste buds to another brilliant restaurant in Lyon.... confirming that going to lunch at these amazing resturants is definitely the way to go!
Once we had devoured lunch we checked into our B&B, a lovely stone cottage with amazing hosts, set high up on a hill with views literally out across the French Alps (we could see Mont Blanc some 200km away from our bedroom window!!!). Unfortunately things took a turn and Boni became quite ill which meant we did not get try any local Gamay in the region given we were only there for one night… but I guess this just means we will have to go back.... shame!