Road Trip to Champagne

We just returned from a 4 day road trip to the Champagne region with a stop in Chartres on the way home.  All of this starts with renting a car and slogging through the narrow old streets of this complicated city to get out of town...

We arrived ahead of our friends and started with a tasting at Ruinart which is owned now by LVMH.  They're the oldest Champagne house in existence.  We weren't particularly thrilled with the cost/value here but we did get to taste some fairly high end stuff and discover that we didn't enjoy it nearly enough to pay the prices!

You could pick 2 tastings out of the 4.  Collectively these bottles retail for over $700.


We also stopped at something called The Museum of the Reddition.  It's where the agreement between the Germans and the Allies was signed that ended WWII.  A very moving experience to be in the room...




We then met up at the Chateau (hotel) with our friends Stan & Sarah (we call them Lord Andrew and Lady Sarah ;).  We shared a safari vehicle in Tanzania exactly one year ago.  They drove over to France from England (via the Chunnel) to meet us.  We're lucky to have met them and become friends -- in all our time together the conversation has never lagged.  Here's our 'home' in Champagne:


We went to 3 other Champagne houses with them. First, to Taittinger. Then to Domaine Boizel, finally to Champagne Roger Brun.  The vintage wines are stored in miles of limestone caves underneath the towns.  The tours typically include a visit to the caves which are pretty photogenic:



At our last visit, Philippe Brun, the founder's son and current winemaker, gave us an extensive tasting because Stan & Sarah have been good customers over the years.  An extremely small producer and an amazing tasting!


After goodbye's and promises to figure out someplace else in the world to meet up, we headed back towards Paris but with a detour to the Chartres Cathedral which has the most amazing stained glass in the world. The pictures don't even begin to do it justice -- this was a 3 hour detour but worth it.




Now back in Paris, the weather continues to be in our favor and we don't plan to do anything for a few days!

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