Join us as we travel across Europe at a leisurely pace.
12/3/22 St Emilion / Bordeaux France
Greetings from beautiful, but cold St Emilion France.
Our Château with the trusty Peugeot guarding the Château Top of the Pyrenees mountains, this is Basque country.
Long drive last Thursday to arrive here, 9 hours and €35 in tolls. Quite a change in the weather as it’s cloudy and cold here 41 degrees
You can see on the map where we are and our drive from Valencia. Long but a beautiful drive. We’re staying in St Emilion, just outside Bordeaux. It’s a beautiful village, very quiet after our time in Spain. This is the view access the alley.Ok, first things first. Close by, the town of Libourne has several fantastic bakery’s. You know where this is headed😎Now that my friends is a French bakery.The real star of the area is wine. Bordeaux is one of the most famous wine producing areas in the world. Bordeaux produces over 700 million liters of wine a year, and has over 8,500 Château’s or wine production facilities .There are over 50 appellations, or designated wine areas in Bordeaux. The French take wine and food very very seriously. Grapes were introduced to the area by who else the Romans. However, it’s the English that are Bordeaux biggest customers.The French are very specific about the wine produced here. They believe the “Terroir “ or what gods gives you should dictate the flavor of the wine🤔I’m not going to get into the whole Bordeaux wine classification thing, it’s way, way to complicated for me. I just like to drink good wine at affordable prices. With that , I’m going to discuss how wine is sold in Bordeaux.
Above is a wine Coop, it’s owned by grape growers and produces over 50 estate brands and 10 of its own labels
The wine can be very very expensive, but they sell wine just ready for sale, no cellar stored bottles.They also sell 5 liter box’s of wine. Most people don’t realize that the biggest selling wine in Italy and France is boxed or bulk wine, where you fill you own container. Surprised?Nest are the château’s, where wine is made and sold. These are staggeringly beautiful. Wine prices from inexpensive to expensive The château’s are everywhere in this area, it’s hard to drive and see all the beauty.Last , but definitely not least is les cavistes , or wine caves as they are called, some free standing that represent a Château.Or a cave selling wine with local producer’s they have agreements to sell with. These places have huge internet sales around the world, especially China which drinks a lot of wine.These places sell wines at multiple price points and specialize in case sales.Than there’s the real caves that sell ready high end wines that are aged and very expensive. Thousands of dollars expensive for one bottle.
Ok, enough wine talk.
Let look at another bakery picture 😎 The French can really bake and cook. They’re not bad at cheese either.
Tour guide Cindy went to Paris yesterday to meet Kate, than they went to Reims for Champagne tasting 😎 Reims also has a spectacular Christmas market that they visit today before drinking the French champagne.Than they’re off to Paris for 4 nights and I’ll hold the wine down. No no hold the château down.
Trafton’s European Tour 2022/2023 
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