After another early departure, we touched down at Nîmes Garons airport in bright sunshine and a biting Mistral. By 10 o’clock we had zipped past flamingos feeding in the Basin de Thau and we were tasting with Roland Géraud from Côtes de Thongue at the Parc des Expositions in Montpellier. Vinisud is a big and […]

The England versus France rugby match, ‘Le Crunch’, that takes place at Twickenham every other year affords us a royal opportunity to make merry with our winemaker friends from across La Manche.  This year Messrs Pascal Labasse, Vincent Cantié and Maxime Graillot travelled over for the weekend with high expectations for ‘Les Bleus’. This enabled […]

(Continuing the voyage down the Rhône valley this week, to catch up with vigneron friends and get an insight into the Rhône 2009 vintage). Domaine Jean-Louis Chave is a key reference point for the entire Rhône valley, and securing an audience with Jean-Louis himself is never easy. Space precludes going into too much detail here, but […]

Last week, we were blessed with a whistle-stop visit from our old friend Crozes Hermitage maestro Alain Graillot and his charming wife (and administrative guru) Elisabeth. Alain graciously agreed to talk us through a flight of his wines and elaborate on his wine making philosophy as well as fielding questions from our inquisitive team in […]

On Day 3, we were up and at ‘em with a climat by climat barrel-tasting of the 2007 Hermitage at the Rhône valley’s most prestigious address – Domaine Jean-Louis Chave in the village of Mauves. The Chaves farm just under 14 of Hermitages precious 131 hectares and have an unbroken ‘de père en fils’ lineage […]