Drinking Sauternes a whole day...

Château d'Yquem

We spent a whole day drinking Sauternes... wonder if that is really healthy? Looking back it wasn't difficult. Wine tasting at the premier cru classé Château Coutet.... Lunch at the one star Michelin restaurant Claude Darroze with three different Sauternes.... and a visit to the legendary Château d'Yquem... tasting a 2008 Yquem was a great way to end a great day! (My anniversary might have had something to do with all this).

This day was organised by the Sauternes tourist office. I very rarely participate in organised events but I really appreciated this one!

I learned that Sauternes is a very small wine district. It represents about one percent of the Bordeaux region total production. The area has a micro climate due to topological reasons. The cold river Ciron falls into the warmer river Garonne, creating morning fog in autumn that spreads over the Sauternes area but is kept within it by the pine trees on one side and the slope on the right side of the Garonne river. Perfect for the Botrytis Cynerea, the fungus responsible for the noble rot necessary to create this sweet wine. And even better with the warm and sunny afternoons, needed to mature the raisin.

I also learned that at Yquem they harvest by hand, raisin after raisin, passing several times by the same grapes to pick them at the perfect moment. They are famous for their quality requirements, so tough that some years they don't even produce a wine with their grapes. (In that case they sell them anonymously as Sauternes grapes...)

Château Coutet

Lunch at Claude Darroze, among many other delicate servings, what about lamb with your Sauternes? (I don't even show the foie gras crème brulée, nor the lobster ravioli or the Aquitaine caviar...)

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Look at the different colors of our three sauternes, the deepest being from 1973... and the other two both 2005.

View over the Yquem vines... the castle is on top of a small hill.

Old traditions...

The Yquem grapes before the fungus start its action.

Comptoir Cuisine, new restaurant in Bordeaux

Maria and Roy came to visit us this weekend. Maria is one of those friends who first moved to Sydney - darn her - and then just recently moved to England - bless her - so when I picked them up at the airport in Bordeaux, we took a quick trip to Bordeaux to have lunch and walk around. The Comptoir Cuisine is a new restaurant next to the Regent Hotel. Open cuisine downstairs and classic restaurant upstairs. We had todays menu; delicious salmon tartar, bass and pudding.

Then we walked around and admired a Bordeaux that is always lovely, even when the weather is very grey.

Modern style in the restaurant

Detail

The fountain at Place du Parlement

Before and after!

In front of Place de la Bourse

La Table du Lavoir at Caudalie

We went to meet up with friends who after many years as expats in the north of France have returned to their home country close to la Brède outside Bordeaux. First an Osso Bucco like my mum used to make.... thank you Noëlle!

Then lunch at a place I have wanted to get to know for a while, les Sources de Caudalie. It is an hotel, two restaurants and a spa surrounded by vines next to Château Haut Smith. A very smart girl asked herself if she couldn't use the waste from the wine making process to make beauty products... yes, exactly that. Apparently research has showed that the skin of raisins contain lots of highly effiecient ingredients to make your skin look better! I had a look at the price list. You just need 100 euros to get started.... maybe old Santa can help out?

We didn't try any of the massages or baths in wine, but an extremely nice lunch at their second restaurant La Table du Lavoir. The setting, the decorations, the service, the food.... truly an excellent experience!

Sweet October day at Pyla, Arcachon....

Almost 30 degrees the whole weekend... an incredible Saturday (with my husband working with the barbecue) ending with boeuf de Chalosse on the plancha and a lukewarm evening on the terrace... really felt like high summer time.

We spent Sunday around Arcachon. First lunch in Arcachon and then - my daughter has been asking for this whole summer - we went to Dune de Pyla again. The skies were grey but this place is still amazing....


First lunch at Café de la Plage. Oysters of course!


And the traditional sausage to accompany the oysters. At least that is what they do here in Arcachon.


I had a lovely whole dorade.


This is the place.

You can have just a drink too.

The beach in front of the restaurant, in between the two piers where the sightseeing boats take off.

My husband gazing out over the sea.

Kids were swimming!!! Adults too.


Here we are at the top of Dune de Pyla in Pyla-sur-Mer. The most visited tourist attraction in Gironde, well worth the trip.


The sky was grey but at times the sun shone through.


What a play area! But also adults were rolling down the sandy hill, running like crazy, jumping to make spectacular photos....


Here comes the sun. Only lasted a short while but wow....


The trees down there looked very small from over 100 metres high up.

Aqualand, amusement parc full of water

Aqualand in Gujan Mestras is an attraction parc based on water.... perfect for a day with 30 degrees!

This is how we celebrated the last day of the summer vacation....

Pontet-Canet, my husband's pet wine

I thought my husband would start to cry. I didn't get any primeurs 2009 from Pontet-Canet, he said. The internet connexion broke off when I was about to pay and when it came back, they were already all sold out. I didn't know what to say. Pontet-Canet is his favorite wine. It felt like being in front of someone who just got their dog run over by a car. What do you say?

Primeur, for those of you who are not that much into wine, is when you buy a wine just after the harvest. You then wait for a year or two before getting your bottles, but you get a good price. Well, good and good, everything is relative. My husband insists to say it is an investment to buy a bottle of Pontet-Canet. I agree, but only if we don't drink them ourselves first - which I doubt strongly.

Pontet-Canet was classified as a fifth grand cru of Médoc in the 1855 classification. It puts it right at the top, but many people - like my husband - thinks it should be placed even better. Knowing that wines like Latour, Lafite and Mouton Rothschild belong to the same area, makes it easy to understand the level of quality I am talking of.  They belong to the great wines of a great wine area.

When we went to visit the Pontet-Canet domain in 2008 it was among my first visits to a wine castle. It was everything I had imagined, a fine castle, century old trees in a vast setting, a passionate and knowledgeable guide, taking us through the vines, the wine making facilities and ending with a tasting. I had imagined it would be a nice visit, but actually it was so interesting and it really made me passionate about seeing other places. Since then we have done many visits, which I still enjoy, but unfortunately I have also discovered that all places are not as good at receiving visits as Pontet-Canet, nor as rigorous with their vines.

At that time, they were sad, because they had been obliged to end the three-year biological farming needed to get a bio certification on the third and last year. Due to a very rainy season they added pesticides to save at least a small part of the harvest. But they were determined to continue. They also told us about their experimentation with using horses instead of machines. Sounds very medieval, but the only reason is to avoid compressing the soil with the heavy machines. Admittedly the horses required more work than the machines...

According to a recent article in Le Monde, Pontet-Canet is the only biological wine farmer in the Médoc area. Wine specialists' agree to say that the Pontet-Canet, already a very fine wine from the beginning, has acquired an even higher level of quality since they introduced the biological farming. Other castles are curious, but so far, they have not had the courage to start. I hope it is only a question of time.

Official site Pontet-Canet where I found the horse photo.

Teich, the bird paradise

Teich and its ornitological parc is the place to make you interested in birds, if you're not already into birds. You find this protected area next to the Arcachon Bay, a bay rich in fish and a great feeding stop for migrating birds. Among many others, here you'll find a great population of cranes.

The parc area of 120 ha stretches over several different water landscapes, from drier parts with forest and meadows towards the sea through wetlands and lagons, which means that you can find any kind of bird here, no matter what living conditions they prefer.

There are differents paths proposed, a super short of about 200 metres, a medium of 2 km and a long of 4 km. Along the paths you find view points and explanatory signs, pictures of the most common birds and some information about their habits.

Silver heron with a fish catch. Photo Phil033 Flickr.

When I went there last spring with the children, we tried the medium path. Parts of it is surrounded by bushes, planted both to offer protection and hiding places for the birds as well as berries and insects.  We felt like being in a cocoon with birds singing all around us - although we don't see most of them - and here and there comes openings towards water points. Very, very peaceful.

We had only one pair of binoculars - you can rent them - so the children took turns looking at the birds. Each new bird became a discovery! Look, a swan! There swims a duck! We studied the mighty cranes, high up hatching their newly  laid eggs. We entered the covered sighting places, to watch without being seen. Here comes a high gaggling sound .... it is the cranes!


Afterwards we had a picnic by the little pond just outside the parc. The water was chilly, but the place must be really nice in summer, to have a little swim after the birds and maybe even an icecream from the little hut next to it.

White storks. Picture Wikipedia.  

Exciting to watch witout being seen...

Peaceful too.

Curious duck!

The little pond just outside the parc.

Amusement parc in Gujan-Mestras

I've written about the oyster fishing village Gujan-Mestras before, but now it is time to add something different. There are no less than three amusement parcs in this area, Aqualand with 8 ha of pools and all sorts of water games, biggest parc in Aquitaine,  Coccinelle where you can play, watch magic tricks and a farm where you can feed the animals and last but not least, Kid Parc, an adventure island for children 0-12 years.

We went to Kid Parc last summer. The kids loved it! I liked it too, especially because I felt that the size was human, so you quickly got an overview of what there was to do.  I have now promised that we will go there again. I have just not given a specific date yet...

Assemblage, the secret behind the Bordeaux wine

Last year we went on a special wine outing arranged by the Bordeaux Tourist Office in cooperation with Les Médocaines, four female wine growers in the Médoc wine area. At the La Tour de Bessan Castle we learned a little about assemblage, the art of mixing different grapes to create a wine. Here they say that assemblage is what gives the Bordeaux wines their soul.

The La Tour de Bessan Castle does not resemble a castle. It's a futuristic creation in the shape of a cube, totally modern. When we arrive we are greeted by Marie-Laure Lurton, the owner, who shows us three different wine glasses in front of each seat. The first glass contains a wine made of merlot grapes, the second a wine made of cabernet sauvignon grapes and the third a mix of the two grapes.


Our first task is to taste the merlot wine and give our impressions. I'm a bit surprised to say that my first impression is... alcohol! It smells strongly of alcohol. I'm right, the merlot grape is strong and has a natural alcohol content of 12-14 percent. Usually the merlot grape gives a wine that is soft, fruity and with little acidity.

Then we try the second glass with only cabernet sauvignon. Here I feel the harshness first, the tannins that make my tongue curl. Then I feel a bit of spiciness and a sensation of volume that was lacking in the first glass. The cabernet sauvignon grape is said to be the king of grapes when it has the right ripeness, it gives a rich aroma, structure from the tannins and taste sensations that last in your mouth. It is a wine that can be kept for a long time.

Finally we try the last glass and are asked to guess the percentage of merlot and cabernet sauvignon. Once again I feel the alcohol strongly, but also that astringency.... I like the mix! But how much of what? I guess that there is more of merlot, but the answer is 85 percent of cabernet sauvignon..... Still got a long way to go before I make it as a wine expert!
 

During this trial we didn't try any wine made with cabernet franc, the third most common grape in Bordeaux. It is common on the right side of the Garonne river and gives and elegant touch, something that is enhanced when the wines are kept. There is also a fourth kind of grape, petit verdot. It represents only five percent of the total volume, because it is difficult to grow, but adds elegance to the final wine.

Grapes are always different, even if they come from the same vineyard and are of the same variety. The vines have different ages, grow in different soils with different exposal to the sun and the climate varies from one year to the other. Most wine makers separate the grapes from different areas and store them separately. This way, when the storage period is over, the wine maker has a palette of tastes to choose from, to mix to create the final wine. This is also to create stability in the final wine, so you can recognise the character of a castle even if a sunny year has made the grapes sweeter or lots of rain has made them watery.

Marie-Laure, the owner, tells us that assemblage is a group activity. I can't work alone, she says, I'm not objective enough! At her castle she works with the wine director, the production responsible and a wine assembly consultant. She compares it to the dynamics of a group, sometimes you have a competent and nice person - but he doesn't fit into the group.

A romantic getaway in Saint Emilion

Saint-Emilion might look like the standard example of a tourist trap. It is very touristic - but still. This little medieval city has an incredible amount of charm. UNESCO has put both the city and the surrounding vineyards on the world cultural heritage list. Steep stone laid streets, real old stone houses with thick walls and wine shops in every corner. At several places you have an astounding view over the tiled roofs and the vineyards.

I went there with my husband on a romantic getaway.... perfect! We stayed at the Logis de la Cadène, one of these real old places with stone walls and furniture with a history. From our room we saw out over the restaurant below and its terrace covered in vines. We had lunch there, with the sun light filtering through the leaves...

In the evening the city became quiet as the tourist buses disappeared. We enjoyed watching the beautiful houses, even more beautiful in the late sun. The stones glowed. Dinner was had at Le Tertre, a small restaurant that had lined up three little tables along the wall outside. We lingered over dinner and a bottle of wine for hours, enjoying the coolness of the evening after a very hot day.

During the day we had also made a short visit to Pomerol, one of my favourite wine districts and one of the smallest in France. We went to the Beauregard castle where a guide took care of the two of us, taking us for a stroll in the vines, down in the cellar for a tasting of the year's wine, still not tapped, and finally let us taste some of their bottled wine. Excellent...

Photo Wikipedia

We also checked out the Maison du vin de Saint-Emilion, where all the different producers are represented at the same prices as you get directly from the owners. They also give advice about what to buy, how to to store them, what kind of wine that fits with what kind of food, etc.

At another occasion we had a look at the underground of Saint Emilion. Underneath the city, a Swiss cheese, with 200 kilometres of winding tunnels!  They were created as workers extracted limestone to build houses from the ninth to the 19th century. Mustn't have an earthquake here, the whole city would simply collapse....

Saint Emilion tourist office