Languedoc Day 1 - CARCASSONNE!!

Carcassonne!! (NOT MY PHOTO)

I had played the game Carcassonne, but didn't know the game was set in a real medieval walled city until a few years ago. Some adventurous friends of ours have always had it on their bucket list of places to visit, but somehow I got there first! 

Two ladies tickled pink to be standing outside of Carcassonne

Carcassonne!!

The city was a thriving metropolis with a castle, double-walls, and loads of defensive towers built in the 11th  and 12th Centuries. Carcassonne is situated near the southern French boarder with Spain and during the middle ages was a region with a devout Cathar majority. Sadly, the city and region fell into loads of trouble with the Catholics in the 13th Century and, you know, the whole Spanish Inquisition and stuff.  

Cemetery outside of Carcassonne

Entrance gates to Carcassonne

I had to remind myself who and what the Cathars were, so I figured some of you could use a reminder as well. Here's a quick summation, amalgamated from a few separate websites:

Catharism was a Christian dualist or Gnostic revival movement that thrived in some areas of Southern Europe, particularly northern Italy and southern France, between the 12th and 14th centuries. Catholic theologians debated with themselves for centuries whether Cathars were Christian heretics or whether they were not Christians at all.

Cathars were strict about biblical injunctions - notably those about living in poverty, not telling lies, not killing and not swearing oaths. However, Cathars also largely regarded men and women as equals, and had no doctrinal objection to contraception, euthanasia, or suicide. In some respects, the Cathar and Catholic Churches were similar, and in other ways polar opposites. 

Double-wall security gates and guard towers

Another view of the double-walls of Carcassonne

After hundreds of years of trials and tribulations the city of Carcassonne was no longer a defensive stronghold for anyone and by the 17th Century it had slipped into disrepair. By the early 19th Century historians felt it was worth re-building, so a lot of the crumbling defensive structures were demolished and re-built to its once former glory. Therefore, many of the outer walls and towers are only (*only*) 150+ years old, but the majority of the castle and city streets remain as they were built some 800+ years ago.  

Just a regular street in Carcassonne 

Another street

We arrived in Carcassonne several hours later than we had originally planned (too much fun wine tasting!) and found many of the locals and tourists were heading home as we arrived, as well as most of the shops were closing up for the day. This actually made for a very enjoyable walk around the streets and city since Marianne and I weren't there for shopping, anyway.  We had about an hour and a half before our group's dinner reservations, which was plenty of time to cruise the streets and see the walls and towers. 

And yet another

And another

Sadly, the castle was closed by the time we arrived; that's the only thing I regret we didn't have time to see. We could look through the gates onto the original, 12th Century castle and its courtyard, but we could get no farther.

Carcassonne Castle 

Another view of Carcassonne Castle 

Defensive fortification near castle

We also had time to go inside of the Cathedral of St. Nazaire and St. Celse, built in the 13th Century (prior to and during the beginnings of the Cathar troubles). France and the Catholic church gave Carcassonne a particularly difficult time simply because the nobleman in charge of the city and many of its Catholic clergy let the city's inhabitants practice Catharism in private as long as they showed face in church when required of them.  That didn't end well for the nobleman nor the Catholic clergy (or the Cathars). But the church they built during that time period was indeed beautiful! 

Inside the cathedral

Original 13th C Rose window in cathedral

Okay, okay! Enough already with the history bits - we also had great wine and food! A specialty of the Languedoc region is cassoulet and we went to a restaurant said to be one of the best for cassoulet in Carcassonne. It takes them 3 days to make each batch of cassoulet and it was DELICIOUS and very, very filling. I attempted to make a 6-hour version in my crock pot for Bill to try when I got home… not even close. Oh well, I tried! 

The dinner's wine

Cassoulet, a regional specialty of Carcassonne

Wine Tasting Day1 - Domaine J. Laurens

After our fine lunch and brief hang-out in the sun while we waited for even more cases of wine to be loaded to our bus, it was off to the third winery… 2-1/2 hours late, but so it goes...

Drive to our last winery of the day

Our last winery of the day was another family-run place who produce sparking wine. We received another tour, and this time we saw some production and bottling taking place. 

Just a few bottles of wine...

There were walls and walls of stacked wine bottles. The gal giving us our tour explained that the aging bottle of sparkling wine can be dangerous; at one point during the tour she pointed out a gaping hole in the stacks of bottles where a bottle of wine had exploded and had to be carefully removed. She said that an exploding bottle has been known to take out several bottles around it, thereby leaving loads of broken glass and an unstable stack of wine. Not to mention a loss in revenue. But this is the way it's done, so… this is the way it's done. 

Wine aging in the bottle

She explained that sparkling wine also has to be rotated in the bottle. I forget why, but it's important to do so. Some wineries turn the bottles by hand, but in this particular facility they had a fancy bottle turning contraption. They'd load up the crates with bottles and then over the course of several days the cases would slowly be rotated as required. Sadly, this machine was not on the day we were there. 

Wine turning contraption

Wine that had been aged and turned were ready for wrapping and labeling. We were lucky and got to watch one lady work the machine while we were there. I really liked that almost everyone we met working at this facility were women. It was a nice change of pace to see so many female winemakers! 

Wine bottling and labeling machine + woman

After our tour we took a quick stroll through a small vineyard and then made our way into the wine tasting room. 'Cause, you know, it had been almost two hours since we had done any wine tasting. Oh, the horror! 

Grapes at J Laurens 

We tasted three sparkling wines, all of which were okay, but I thought not nearly as yummy as the wines at the first two locations. I ended up purchasing two bottles of the brut, because, well… what's life without a little bubbly from time to time! 

A blurry rose

Brut

3rd wine… goofed and took a second picture of 2nd wine. Who, me? Drinking?  

Wine Tasting Day1 - Chateau Mignan

Peter, the wine guy and tour organizer, had a clipboard and a sheet for each winery. At the end of each tasting we would go up to him and give him our order (if any). He kept meticulous notes for each person's purchases, then placed one transaction for everyone and the winery quickly gathered up all the wine and added it to the coach (bus) storage. 

Peter had estimated that the group would spend 3,000 euro on wine over the course of visiting seven wineries. We spent that much at our very. first. winery. Ha! 

Heading towards our second winery of the day

We made our way to our second winery, which we found without any sat nav troubles. 

Chateau Mignan

Sorry for the blurry photo below! Chateau Mignan had a delightful winemaker give us a tour and talk about his wine. Unfortunately, he only spoke French! Peter translated what he could, but the wine maker was so enthusiastic, I'm afraid I didn't catch most of his talking points. Most of the folks on the trip were Brits, and many of them had a passing knowledge of French, so I think I was one of the few who couldn't keep up. 

New French oak barrels in barrel room 

By the time the tour was done, we were taken into the wine tasting room where we were served a lunch of charcuterie and bread. We acted as though we hadn't eaten in days! 

Someone was really hungry for lunch! 

We also tasted four more delicious wines: a white, red, deeper red (Les Trois Clochers), and Le Grand (L'oeil du Temp).  The wines were all very tasty, but I think I was also swayed by the food as I bought two white, two red, and two of their best, Le Grand. I picked up two of the whites as I think Bill will really enjoy them. I bought doubles of the reds that I liked because we were told they'd age really well. We're hoping to set some aside to drink with our California family and friends when we eventually move back home. 

Basic white: very mineral-y

Basic Red: blackberry/herbal/earthy; 20% oak

Deep Red: Les Trois Clockers

Le Grand / L'oeil du temp

Fully sated, we ambled back out of the winery and basked in the sun as we awaited our purchases to be rung up and bundled onto the bus. 

Old-timey grape crushing gear

And then it was off to our third and final winery of the day. Oh, what a tough life! 

Olden-timey plow

Wine Tasting Day1 - Domaine L'Ostal Cazes

Our first full day of wine tasting begins! But first, we got lost about three times trying to find the first stop. Apparently the sat nav (GPS) gave the bus driver perfect instructions… but the tiny French village streets we had to drive down weren't always large enough for our bus! We had our first of many 63-point u-turns less than one hour into our first wine tasting excursion. We got to the first winery eventually, but we were already behind schedule. Oopsies! 

Walking up to the former brick factory turned winery

All of the wineries that we visited are places where Peter, our wine teacher, has personal relationships with the owners. Although each of the wineries had wine tasting rooms, it seemed like they didn't catered to large groups, so we were kind of an anomaly for them. This was nice because I had imagined our wine tour would consist of our bus pulling up to each winery at our appointed hour, only to see the last hour's bus pulling out. Even though we were on a bus tour, it didn't feel like a bus tour, if you know what I mean. 

L'Ostal Cazes

At the first winery, L'octal Cazes, as with all the others, we were greeted by one of the winemakers, given a tour of the vineyard (and/or bottling / aging warehouse) before moving on to the tasting. 

Stainless steel aging vats

New French oak barrels for second round of aging

We tasted four wines at this first location: white, rose, red, and a fancy red (grand vin). I'll add my notes below for any of my wine nerd friends. I purchased 1 white, 1 rose, and 1 red.

White: 70% viognier / 15% ? 15% ?

Red: 60% syrah / 30% grenache / 10% ?

70% syrah, 15% Cab 10% Grenache

50%/50% syrah / grenache blend

We had a lot of wines to get through and I'm all for enjoying wine but I've never been one to enjoy getting drunk. Therefore, I was pleased we received small pours for tasting and that most people in our party had one or two sips of each wine, took a few big sniffs, wrote their notes, then poured the rest of the wine into the spit bucket. I know, I know, so boring… but trust me - we had a lot of wine ahead of us that day! 

To the South of France!

A friend of mine. Marianne, and her husband belong to a wine tasting club in town. Back in February Bill and I attended a group lunch and Marianne mentioned to her husband that she wanted to go on the French wine tasting trip the leader was planning and her husband said he'd figure it out at work so that he'd be the main care-taker of their three girls so that she could go on the trip. I happened to overhear this conversation and said, "Want someone to go with you? I'd go!" And just like that I invited myself on a week-long wine tasting trip to the South of France. 

Somewhere in the Spanish Pyrenees

There were 18 of us on the trip, add in the bus driver and group leader, 20 people in total. 19 of us flew down to Barcelona where we met the bus (driver left a few days early and drove there via ferry), drove over the Pyrenees, and landed in the Languedoc region in Southern France, near the Spanish boarder. 

Le Cote Bleue

We stayed at that hotel, right on the water for four nights and spent three days exploring the region and wine tasting at small, (mostly) family-run wineries. The tour leader is a wine expert who used to have a restaurant, then a wine importing business. He had personal relationships with all of the wineries and each place treated us to a tour, wine tasting, and often food. 

Hotel at Le Cote Bleue

Once we arrived at the hotel, Marianne and I dropped off our stuff and took a little walk along the beach to check out the small village. 

Beach near Le Cote Blue

It was warm, but not hot. The ocean breeze was lovely, and it was a terrific start to what would end up being an amazing week. 

Beach near Le Cote Blue

The first of many bottles of delicious wine! 

White dinner wine

Red dinner wine

And the first of many, many delicious meals!