July | 2017 | Chris & Sue's Excellent(?) Adventures

Monthly Archives: July 2017

Château Lamothe Bergeron, Cussac-Fort-Médoc

Continuing with our travel in the Bordeaux-Medoc region …

At Pauillac’s tourist information, we asked about any last minute tour and they suggested we try Château Lamothe Bergeron, Cussac-Fort-Médoc, without a reservation.

By the time we got there, all the visitors had left already. The owner/manager saw us lingering and asked the guide to give us a tour. A private tour !

Everything about this establishment seem new even though it has been around for a long time, the chateau was built in 1868. The wine is classified as Cru Bourgeois, Haut-Medoc.

The reception area is decorated like a living room.

The tour started with a visit to a hut overlooking a field of grapes.

Some of the big production spaces on the tour have nightclub lightings.

With massive stainless steel tanks lining the space, reflective walls and high ceilings, all one need is a DJ and nice sound system.

The tour included a multimedia experience, a kind of augmented reality without the headset. Very slick presentation of the blending process projected on a glass partition with the barrel room in the background – state of the art technology.

According to its web site (click here):

Nestling between the terroirs of Margaux and Saint-Julien, Lamothe-Bergeron forms part of the closed circle of châteaux “with a river view”, in other words those occupying the best gravels left by the Gironde estuary. This magical soil warms the grapes, provides perfect drainage and produces grapes with finesse…

The vineyards cover 67 hectares, of which 58% are planted with Merlot grapes, 38% with Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Cabernet Franc and 2% Petit Verdot.

At the end of the tour, we were invited to try 2 vintages.

The tasting station is diffusely lit from the bottom.

The wines were both good. We bought a 2009 and a 2014.

Fun.

Château Ferrière, Margaux

Continuing with our travel in the Bordeaux-Medoc region …

Everything was last minute on this trip and that made it impossible to join a tour of any one of the famous first growth (Grand Cru Classé – Primer Cru) winemakers. We kind of knew it but kept our plan loose.

The staff at our chateau (see earlier post) was very kind and secured us a spot on a tour of Château Ferrière.

Château Ferrière is a winery in the Margaux appellation of the Bordeaux region of France. The wine produced here was classified as one of fourteen Troisièmes Crus (Third Growths) in the historic Bordeaux Wine Official Classification of 1855.

Interesting machine. We thought grapes are still picked by hand … probably depends on the vinyard.

The 1855 classification contained more wines from Margaux than from any other appellation, and its best-known vineyard, Château Margaux, was one of only four wines to be awarded the Premier Cru status.

We started with a cool dark room where the tanks made of concrete are used for primary fermentation. We did not expect concrete as a material to make the tanks.

The Château has 29 acres (12 hectares) planted with Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc. It has the smallest surface of vines of all the classified growth in 1855. A parcel of this small terroir lies in the heart of the Margaux village, next to Chateau Margaux.

The 1855 Classification resulted from the 1855 Exposition Universelle de Paris, when Emperor Napoleon III requested a classification system for France’s best Bordeaux wines that were to be on display for visitors from around the world. Brokers from the wine industry ranked the wines according to a château’s reputation and trading price, which at that time was directly related to quality.

The tour was led by a staff member using English, although an Italian family joined us on the tour.

The second stage, malolactic fermentation is carried out in new oak barrels.

A second wine is produced under the label Les Remparts de Ferriere. We tried a few vintages and bought two bottles of Chateau Ferriere.

Buying and taking wine home over a long drive is generally not recommended because the temperature in a car under the sun might ruin the wine.

Bon vin.

Château Grattequina, Blanquefort

For the last leg of our Alps-to-Atlantic Easter trip, we stayed in the Bordeaux-Medoc region for a few days. Fa and An stayed behind in Biarritz to do some more surfing.

Our last minute searches landed us at the Château Grattequina in Blanquefort, just north of the city of Bordeaux. Click here for their website.

Built in 1872, the château was surrounded by farmland at the gateway of Bordeaux (which is only about 10 km away), on the road to the Medoc. We entered the grounds through an automatic gate and can see the chateau in a distance.

The sight of the chateau is rather dramatic at night as there are no other lighted buildings in sight. The River Garonne is behind the chateau.

Looking back toward the main road (D209) from the chateau, as far as we can see, there is no vine growing here now, just agricultural land. Corn ? In the middle of the photo is the private access road.

The chateau has only 10 guest rooms, all on the upper two floors. It was restored in 1999 and took 4 years, and it was re-painted this year (we could smell it).

Our room was spacious with simple furniture. It was so quiet all around and therefore quite relaxing.

Loved the double sink in the bathroom, but we would have liked a proper shower.

Very helpful staff. They called a bunch of chateaux for us to check if we can join their tours at the last minute.

Since the chateau is on the left bank of the River Garonne, the chateau has its own private dock, in theory one can arrive by boat. In practice, the owner can take guests into Bordeaux city (upstream) or go wine tasting in Margaux direction (downstream). See boat parked on the left in photo.

The view across the river is rather uninspiring. Because the river is not far from its mouth where it enters the Atlantic Ocean, the flow is slow and the water looks muddy.

The owner lives on the property in a separate modern building, behind the tower.

Nice breakfast room. No on-site restaurant. This chateau is really a B-n-B.

“Enomatic” – wine-on-demand – eight local wines (2 Margaux, Saint-Emilion, Saint-Estephe, Pauillac, Pessac Leognan and Saint Julien) at various price points were sold by the glass. Three sizes to choose from. Pay via a special debit card from the hotel that is settled when checking out. We got several different glasses and enjoyed them with cheeses back in our room.

Next to the chateau is a building that can be used for conferences and weddings. We believe that it is probably a significant part of the business.

The pool was not yet opened but the chateau provides bikes for us to explore the grounds.

Relaxing place to stay if you want easy access to Bordeaux city. But it does not have a working vineyard, unlike those further downstream towards Haut-Medoc.

La Cité du Vins, Bordeaux

After reaching our westernmost destination on our Alps-Atlantic trip at Biarritz (click here to see related posts), we came back via Bordeaux and stopped for a few days to explore the area.

The Cité du Vin is a museum as well as a place of exhibitions and academic seminars on the theme of wine located in the city of Bordeaux.

The building, meant to suggest a decanter, was designed by Anouk Legendre and Nicolas Desmazières of XTU architects.

La Cite du Vins was official opened by the President, François Hollande on May 31, 2016. So the place is not even a year old, it is brand new.

The building has 8 floors with most of the exhibition spaces and classrooms on the lower floors.

In an open exhibition space occupying more than 3,000 m², nearly twenty different themed areas invite you to take a voyage of discovery and enjoy a unique experience exploring the many and varied facets of wine across time and space.

One can spend hours watching, listening, and even smelling the exhibits. There is so much media content to be consumed.

One darkened area has several tables where visitors can sit around and watch a virtual host explain various topics – history, entertaining, food pairing.

The table is actually a screen and the image changes continuously – sometimes it is a dining table but it could morph into another image seamlessly and quickly.

There were several tables that allow visitors to discern the aromas present in a wine. A squeeze of the small black rubber bulb releases the aroma which can be inhaled from the copper horn.

This part of the exhibition was unique in that they provided many different sources of aroma.

We participated in a multi-sensory workshop where we tasted several wines, learnt about its origin (not all were French) and pairing with food around the world. It is “multi-sensory” because certain aromas were sprayed into the room to invoke a sense of a place and its food which were projected on surround screen.

The workshop was entertaining and its delivery employed state of the art technology.

There are 2 restaurants. We did not eat there. Our entry ticket include a free glass of wine to be enjoyed at the belvedere which affords a 360 degree view of the northern end of Bordeaux city and the river Garonne.

“Downtown” direction view of the city of Bordeaux.

There is a souvenir shop “La Boutique” which sells every wine-related gifts one can imagine.

Next to it is the wine store which stocks thousands of bottles from around the world. Not just Bordeaux or French, a truly comprehensive international collection.

We spent almost the entire day here. The city really did a good job in creating this museum to educate and promote wine culture, and giving adults the sense of fun that kids have in a themed amusement park.

Random photos #306 – 315

These are the photos I (Chris) took and posted on Facebook. The series was started in March of 2013. There is no theme – just something random and visually interesting. We gave each a title and noted where it was taken (to the extent we could remember the city).

random photo #306 – portraits – Miami