Wednesday 4th June 2014
Collected our AVIS car this time a 4 door Nissan 6 speed
manual and headed towards Laon which is a medieval walled city with of course a
huge cathedral.
 |
Church in Laon
|
We called in at a cafe in Laon for lunch and AR ordered his
favourite, a large salad but instead of being salad grande it was salad maxi on
the menu. The waitress said it is very big. She wasn't kidding - AR makes huge
salads at home but this one couldn't get to the end. Julie ordered a small
one and it was enormous too.
Drove into the Champagne region to Reims (which used to be
the capital of France
4th-9th centuries) where we had a junior suite at the Mecure to accommodate
Julie and it was quite flash. Had a walk around town and still feeling full
from our salad lunches we opted for snacking in the room for dinner,
accompanied of course by French Champagne being as it was our first night in
the region.
Thursday 5th June 2014
After a short visit to the cathedral where the kings of France were once crowned, we opted for an audio
guided tour of the Palace
of Tau. It is next to the
cathedral and was the palace of the arch bishops of Reims
and houses many of the original pieces from the cathedral as well as crowns and
capes and paintings of the kings and other treasures including a jewelled item
that has a small piece of the timber from the cross Jesus was nailed to. It was
marvellous to see some of the carvings from the original church building facade
up close.
 |
Now these are big salads
|
Time to head toward Epernay,
smaller and less grand then Reims, but in fact the capital of Champagne. We drove through many little
towns and even saw a horse pulling a weeding machine up between the grapes on a
bio-dynamic vineyard. We stopped to take a photo and Julie's French was great
to have a chat to the two workers.
We visited the village
of Hautvillers and had a great Champagne tasting and food at Au 36 before visiting the Abbey St Peter
established in 650AD where Dom Perignon is buried. The town is just beautiful
and was especially interesting as 140 of the houses have a metal painted picture
outside to indicate the vocation of the people (or ancestors) who live there.
Then drove through Cumiers to our very original hotel in Epernay. Even had a couple
of small dogs one who spent an hour talking to us in our room. Had a walk to
the visitors centre and up the Avenue de Champagne where all the major
champagne makers have their cellars and tastings/tours.
Friday 6th June 2014
Packed up the car, coffee and croissant then headed to Moet
& Chandon for a tour and tasting at 10am.
The tour was amazing. It was 28 euros for the 1 hour tour
and 2 flutes and started with the history of the family. Moet was one of the
originals and then his son and then his grandson plus his grand-daughter
married Chandon and they united.
 |
Sandy's sister Julie in front of a narrow house in Laon
|
We went underground 20 metres where they have 27kms of
tunnels where they keep the champagne. All the grapes are picked by hand and
the picking season only lasts two months. We reckon it would be great fun to go
back at that time, it must be so busy with workers! All together with the other
brands that Moet & Chandon own in the Avenue of Champagne they have 120kms
of tunnels - just amazing and dug by hand.
We came up a level to see fork lifts and pallet jacks
working moving stock also in the network of small tunnels and then into the
tasting room.
Headed off towards Paris driving all the little roads
through Dormans, Chateau Thierry, Charly sur Marne before dropping the car back
at an outer suburb in Paris and getting the metro to where will be our local
station for a week, Chemin Vert in the posh area of Marais.
 |
| Laon church |
 |
| Laon is on another join up Camino walking route |
 |
| Laon church remembering the British Empire troops |
 |
| Laon |
 |
| Laon building site - scaffold to keep building upright |
 |
| Reims fountain |
 |
| Interesting packaging for beans and seeds - hey Jane might look good in the Grain Grocer, Launceston |
 |
| Interesting packaging for beans and seeds - hey Jane might look good in the Grain Grocer, Launceston |
 |
| The girls said "when in Champagne.." |
 |
| We should watch the French Open |
 |
| Reims was once the capital of France - here is the oil to anoint the new King when crowned |
 |
| Found a fossil in a statue in the Palace of Tau, Reims |
 |
| The shell was under a part of the sandstone that had fallen off |
 |
| Adam, Eve eating apple and the serpent. |
 |
| Joan of Arc |
 |
| 2300cc motorbike |
 |
| Would go like a rocket too - our car is only 1600cc |
 |
| Champagne country |
 |
| AR driving can't be too bad Julie was smiling |
 |
| Delivery van |
 |
| Spare horse for biodynamic grape weeding |
 |
| I'm after those weeds |
 |
| The lads had a good chat to Julie who is pretty good at French |
 |
| Back to work |
 |
| Champagne tasting |
 |
| Remember these fridge's - this one was wooden |
 |
| Dom Perignon's tomb in the church in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| 140 houses have crafted pieces of iron revealing a small story about the inhabitants in Hautvilliers |
 |
| Moet & Chandon in Avenue de Champagne in Epernay |
 |
| Pol Roger in Avenue de Champagne in Epernay |
 |
| French towbars are different |
 |
| Be very careful with these |
 |
| Worshipping at the feet of the master, Dom Perignon. |
 |
| Our tour guide with grandpa Moet on the left and his son on the right |
 |
| 28kms of hand dug cellars 30 meters under the ground at Moet & Chandon and 120km of tunnels if you count the brands they own on the Avenue de Champagne |
 |
| Bottles stacked 17 bottles deep |
 |
| This stack can contain 14,657 bottles |
 |
| Champagne is made by blending 3 grapes - Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Meunier - the last two are black grapes with white juice so must be handpicked to avoid the white being stained. |
 |
| Napoleon gave them a wooden barrel as a gift |
 |
| After a while the bottles are inverted to get the sediment left from the yeast and sugar fermentation to fall to the neck. They are turned 1/4 of a turn per day and now it is done by a machine but once a person did it and a good one could turn 50,000 bottles a day. Even a bad one could turn 35,000. Now once the sediment has worked its way to the bottom the machine freezes a plug in the neck to -28 degrees and then the champagne pushes out the plug including the sediment and then the bottle is topped up and corked. |
 |
| Started digging tunnels in 1743. Each year their main non-vintage product is blended with the previous year or two to make a consistent product. |
 |
| Just at Moet & Chandon they pick 1200 hectares of grapes which are hand picked in 3 weeks by 3000 pickers. There are 100,000 pickers in the Champagne area in the picking season. Cellars are 10-12 degrees at 80% humidity. |
 |
| Our tasting under the ground |
 |
| Dom Perignon percolating. They only make Dom from exceptional years and last time was 2004. They only ever use grapes from the Grand Cruz areas except they always add a little from a Premier Cruz area near Hautvilliers where Dom Perignon invented champagne. |
 |
| Grape machines everywhere on the roads etc. 'Grand Cruz' areas are worth $A2.25 million per hectare |
 |
| Some good looking bikes in France to mix with all the scooters |
No comments:
Post a Comment