Days 58 thru 61 - Burgundy, France

Over the next several days, we spent some time in the French countryside, staying in the famous wine-producing region of Burgundy. Burgundy is famous for its many Grand Crus (top tier wines), rolling hills, and quaint medieval towns. The region produces red wines made from pinot noir grapes, and white wines from chardonnay grapes. The most famous part of Burgundy is the Cote d'Or, with the Cote de Nuits producing mostly reds in the north, the Cote de Beaune producing mostly whites in the south. The two areas are separated by the town of Beaune, which lies basically in the middle of the Cote d'Or.

We stayed at the Chateau de Melin, a small wine-producing bed and breakfast, housed in a 16th century castle about 10 km southwest of Beaune.

Our main purpose in Burgundy was to relax and become acquainted with the wine. We started by driving down the Cote d'Nuits, stopping at such famous villages such as Gevrey-Chambertin and Nuits-Saint-Georges to do some wine tastings. Many of the wine producers have shops in the towns where you can sample and buy their wines. Additionally, you can tour their caves, the very old, dark, dank "basements" where they store their wine.

In addition to shops in town, we ventured to several chateau and vineyards. Here we are at Clos Vougeot, one of the most famous Grand Cru vineyards in Burgundy.

In Burgundy, the specific plots of land are classified according to quality, with only 33 plots receiving the top classification of Grand Cru. There are signs along the road with the name of the village and the specific name of the vineyard, so you know if you are looking at Grand Cru, Premier Cru, Village, or Regional grapes.

We also visited Chateau de Meursault in the Cote de Beaune and did an extensive tasting in their endless caves. Even though a chateau or producer is located in one specific village, they may own vineyards and plots of land all over Burgundy. Chateau de Meursault has widespread holdings, so we were able to try both reds and whites from all over the Cote d'Or.

Because we were in Burgundy in early September, we got to witness the beginning of the harvest. All of the grapes are picked by hand, so we saw lots of people in the fields, baskets on their backs, working to harvest the grapes at their peak ripeness.

On Saturday, we drove into Beaune to explore the town. In the morning we wandered around the weekend market and saw the famous Hospices de Beaune with its Flemish tile roof.

After lunch, we headed for the main event, the Marche aux Vins (wine market). Here, we wandered their caves for two hours tasting over a dozen wines. We had fun trying to describe the wines (spicy, with a hint of blackberry), and our descriptions obviously grew more creative, and more silly, the more wine we drank.

While in Burgundy, we also made it a point to thoroughly sample the local cuisine. We had escargot (I even got Brian to eat one) and boeuf bourguignon (a sort of beef and wine stew), coq au vin (chicken cooked slowly in wine), and ouefs en meurette (eggs poached in wine - are you starting to see a pattern?).

Our time in Burgundy was very relaxing. Our days generally went something like this: eat breakfast, drive the countryside and taste wine, eat lunch and have wine, drive the countryside and taste wine, nap, drink a bottle of wine, eat dinner and drink wine. Pretty demanding, huh? Our relaxation was also aided by the general beauty of the region. The pictures below only scratch the surface of the rolling vineyards, quaint villages, and sprawling chateaux of the region.

On our last day, we drove south to the town of Cluny through the Cote Chalonnaise. Cluny is home to the ruins of the 10th century Abbey of Cluny, which was the largest and most powerful church in the Middle Ages before St. Peter's Basilica was built. The building is mostly in ruins today because it's stones were looted during the French Revolution.

We continued driving south and stayed the night in Lyon in preparation for our flight the next morning. Though only in the city for a few hours, we briefly explored and had dinner at a traditional Lyonnais bouchon.

Additional thoughts/notes:
- Don’t wear a white shirt to a wine tasting. Only bad things can happen.
- The French are very particular about their eating times. Lunch is 12-2pm. No earlier, no later. And all other shops are closed during lunch. Do not have a late breakfast, attempt to taste wine from 12-2pm, and then try to eat lunch around 2:30pm. You will end up thirsty and hungry.
- Brian was sick of French radio in our rental car, so he decided to buy a cheap CD at the Beaune market. I was wandering through the market when he made this decision, so I wasn't there to provide the usual monitoring that keeps Brian out of trouble. He bought a "King of Pop" remix CD expecting to hear dance remixes of Michael Jackson songs. However, he failed to see that on the back the songs were sung by "Mickeal Jackson." Needless to say, Brian wasn't very happy with the casio keyboard remakes he heard when he listened to the CD.
- On one of our wine tastings, when we went down into the cave, we mistakenly stumbled into a band of drunken Swedes. There were at least thirty of them (on some winery tour), and their two boisterous leaders quickly befriended us and tried to assimilate us into the group. When we asked them where they were from, they said, "Sweden, land of Ikea." Brian responded, "We have an Ikea in Atlanta" to which they responded, "Of course you do!!" I think they were ready to adopt us and take us on their tour bus, but we sneaked out while they were preoccupied with their next wine.