Wednesday 12th February 2020.
St Émilion is a wine growing region, with the UNESCO world heritage village of the same name being 35 kilometres north east of Bordeaux. We took a minibus tour there with couples from Japan, USA and South Africa.
The Romans planted vineyards in the region as early as the 2nd century. The monk Émilion settled in a hermitage carved into the rock there in the 8th century. The monks who followed him started up the commercial wine production in the area.
We drove around some beautiful wine chateaux and had a tour of this one.
The views were quite spectacular.
The winery had two processing units - one traditional and the other modern.
St Émilion is a wine growing region, with the UNESCO world heritage village of the same name being 35 kilometres north east of Bordeaux. We took a minibus tour there with couples from Japan, USA and South Africa.
The Romans planted vineyards in the region as early as the 2nd century. The monk Émilion settled in a hermitage carved into the rock there in the 8th century. The monks who followed him started up the commercial wine production in the area.
We drove around some beautiful wine chateaux and had a tour of this one.
The views were quite spectacular.
The winery had two processing units - one traditional and the other modern.
We did a tasting, but at 70 euros a bottle, didn't buy any .....
..... but the views were priceless.
There are 200 kilometers of underground tunnels in the region, which provided limestone for the construction of buildings in the village, and also for the city of Bordeaux.
We had some time to walk around the exquisite Mediaeval village of St Émilion itself (population about 2,000). Apparently in summer you have to queue up to take this picture looking down on the town square. We were able to just walk up to it.
More of St Émilion.
Sheep and lamb.
The Brunet Gate is the only one remaining out of the town's original seven.
The Saint-Emilion Monolithic (carved from a single rock) Church was constructed in the early twelfth century, and is partly subterranean. It is often visited by pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostella in Spain.
On our way back to Bordeaux, our guide conducted a quiz where we had to identify scents (sniffed from bottles passed around the bus) associated with wines, e.g. almonds, berries, spices etc. In spite of only correctly identifying one (vanilla) I was declared the winner for guessing the name of a green vegetable (capsicum) that no-one could identify (capsicum wine - how horrible!) A good time was had by all.
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