Burgundy with Mom and Dad

Perhaps the world most famous white wine vineyard.

Puligny-Montrachet.

Getting ready for lunch at Pierre and Jean in Champy. 

Potatoes, creme, butter, more cream and a bottle of red Burgundy - yummm.

Cave of Domaine Rodolphe Demougeot.

Meursault - Classic tiled roof of Burgundy.

Tasting at Domaine Maurice Chapuis - 13th century cave.

Breakfast at Hostellerie Du Vieux Moulin.

The famous vineyard of Romanee Conti - was able to taste a grape, which may be the closest I'll come to tasting wine from this vineyard.

Remeberance Day in France.

Good news for Steve and Maria - Burgundy is on the Camino de Santiago!

Tasting at Domaine Varoilles.

Another village, another memorial to its fallen citizens - may we all never forget.

Steve sometimes refers to Burgundy as the "other Piemonte". And like Alba, the family have several favorite little places in this favorite place.  We find Burgundy a place where the whole family can get away for the weekend to eat, drink, and be merry. It has something for everyone. What is also nice is that it is only 2.5 hours from our house, so an easy drive. Steve heard that Grandpa Bill and Grandma Jean liked Burgundy but didn't get a good chance to visit the vineyards and have a proper wine tasting experience in Burgundy. So off we went for an overnight trip. We packed a bunch in - visiting all the significant villages in both the Cote de Beaune and Cote de Nuits.

In Cote de Beaune we tasted wine in Chassagne Montrachet at a communal tasting room and finished with lunch at Pierre et Jean, a lovely spot with fantastic food in Champy. We all indulged in foie gras and Beef Burgundy accompanied with a bottle of red from St. Aubin. Our next visit was at Domaine Rodolphe Demougeot in Meursault. It was a nice spot where Steve demonstrated more creative use of his French as the tasting was only in French. What is fun about some of the Burgundy tastings is that the bottles are often unlabled - they are marked with white chalk - and are held in old caves of the domain. Many are several hundred years old. The towns in Cote de Beaune are as charming and quaint as their northern neighbors. Mersault was an unexpected surprise with beautiful examples of the famous tiled roofs. On the way to Mersault, we stopped in all the villages of Cote de Beaune and located many of the important Premiere and Grand Crus vineyards - things that used to only be words us on a wine labels and restaurant wine lists - like Le Montrachet and Les Rugiens.

We then we headed north and stopped at Steve's favorite overlook in Pernand Vergelesses before heading to Domain Chapuis in Aloxe-Corton to taste wine with Maurice, a veteran of a one year visit to Waterville, ME in 1972. This was Steve's second visit. Each time has been fun and educational. It is fun to learn about the soils in the different vineyards, the intersting characters that make-up the winemaking community in Burgundy, and history of the area.

With a car full of wine bottles and Grandpa Bill wondering how he would get all this wine home, we headed to Hostellerie Du Vieux Moulin, our favorite hotel in Bouilland, France. Bouilland is a lovely, small town outside Savigny des Beaune. The proprietors are gracious hosts and the hotel has a fantastic restaurant. As usually, the food was fantastic and the 1998 Jean Grivot Les Roncieres was incredible - what a treat.

Following a relaxing breakfast, we said good bye to our friends at the hotel and off to to the villages of the Cote de Nuit. Sunday was November 11 - Rememberance Day. Each village has a memorial dedicated to the fallen fathers and sons of the Great War and World War II. We saw several ceremonies taking place and most of the memorials were decorated with ribbons and wreaths. The scars left on these tightly knit communities have healed but have not been forgotten, which is a good thing. May we never, ever forget.

We took the small vineyard road that lead past the equally famous villages and vineyards of the Cote de Nuit, including a stop at the famous Romanee Conti. We tasted wines at Gevrey Chambertin at Domain Varoilles. The propreitaire was delightful and very patient with Steve's creative French language skills. We headed home filled, literally and figuratively, with the delights of a wonderful part of the world.