The next port on our trip took us to La Rochelle, France. This is the closest cruise port to the Bordeaux wine region. This was our first excursion with the entire group together. We met our private tour bus at the port and took off to Bordeaux. This is a beautiful region. There are quaint French wineries and farms everywhere. It was a little over 2 hours to get to Bordeaux from the port. Our first stop was a French winery called Chateau Haut-Bailly. We called it "Haut du Bay Bay" after someone's dog. This winery was gorgeous. First of all, we couldn't have asked for better weather. It was clear and sunny. We got to walk around the grounds and were given a tour. Lisa and I have been to several California wineries over the years, and understand their wine making methods. The French do it a little different. First off, they mix their vines within each plot of land. So in one block of the vineyard they have have vines of cabernet, merlot, petit verdot and others. That was very interesting. California has the same varietal for an entire block. After that, the grapes were brought into the barn to be sorted and then they are put in much smaller containers to start. This is also different. At this winery they may only pick one row at a time instead of an entire block. Then put that row into a container. Once several of these smaller containers are full, they put them into the large stainless containers to ferment further. As you can tell, the blending process starts immediately. As we talked to the tour guide, we found out that each winery creates their own blend each year and that is the wine that they release. From year to year, their wine may be completely different depending on either what they put in it or how it is blended. She said that is how a Bordeaux wine is created. You will not find a pure cabernet wine from Bordeaux, it will be blended with something else. She also stressed how important the "terroir" was to the French wine industry. Terroir is the make-up of the soil and earth that is used to grow the grapes. The terroir is different across the Bordeaux region and depending on the area of the region, the wine will taste a little different. We tasted two wines from the vineyard. They were tasty, but they didn't blow our socks off. Lisa and I both decided we liked California wines better.
Next up was to lunch which was in the town of Bordeaux. We drove through the old part of town and even the smaller town of Bordeaux has some very old buildings remaining. This city is one of the main ports for shipping in France. We were dropped off at a fair ground and walked to the main part of town. This was a very quaint pretty town. It was not very big, but it was pretty busy. We were looking for a restaurant and lost a few people at a McDonald's we walked by. They needed some home cooking. We stopped at a cafe and took over the back part of the restaurant. Most of our group go pasta or something safe. I decided to go for the entree sized beef tar tare. I was not sure what this consisted of, but it sounded good. They also had small bottles of wine on the table, so we had a couple of those as well. When she brought out the tar tare it looked like someone had just made a raw hamburger patty and slapped it on my plate. It was a little rougher chop than ground beef though. It was actually very good. I couldn't eat it all, it was a lot of raw beef. The seasoning was great though.
After lunch we headed back to the bus and on to our next stop. The next stop for the day was St. Emilion. I did not know what to expect at this stop. I actually thought we were going to another wine tasting, but that was not the case. St. Emilion is quite a bit different than any of our other stops. It felt more medieval, with everything built from rock and most of it built into the hills. It is a World Heritage site and it's history goes back to prehistoric times. The main attractions here were a Romanesque church and a monolithic church. The Romanesque church was very interesting as it was very old and created when the Romans inhabited France. After we saw the Romanesque church we went to the monolithic church. This was very interesting. It was actually built from and into the hillside. All of it was built with the limestone in this area. We went into the church through underground opening and through the catacombs of the church. It was built in the 8th century. They actually had added modern reinforcements to some of the pillars because the moisture was causing problems with the structure. This church was like nothing I had seen before. It was very primitive. The rest of the town was very charming. A little difficult to walk around as they rocky, wet roads were a little tricky. It was also quite hilly, which made it interesting when we wanted to back up the road to get macaroons at one of shops. They were delicious. Quite a bit different than the macaroons in Paris. These were more traditional almond cookies than the fancy cookie sandwiches we had in Paris.
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| St. Emilion |
After St. Emilion, it was time to go back to the ship. We made it back in time for dinner and then a little bit of gambling after. Since it was a full day and another early morning, we made it an early night.
Next up, Cognac.....
