Sunday Oct 9. Bordeaux

This morning began with a coach trip to the Medoc wine region north of Bordeaux.  Our guide, Sandrine, pointed out sites along the way as well as background about the region, the wines and the vineyards. We had tours & tastings at 2 wineries--- one small and one large:
1. Chateau Baudan
2. Chateau La Tour Carnet

At the first, the owner provided us with an informative tour.  Her French was clear, slow and easy to understand ( tho Sandrine also translated). I've met a gal from Tennessee who used to teach French & we agreed to try to speak French when possible-- Bon!
The winery served us a lovely 4 course lunch, of course with wines!  😊
I'm not a big fan of the reds which was all we got today, but they were very nice wines.

Second was Chateau La Tour Carnet which is a very big operation.  They bottle 600 thousand bottles of wine a year.  The chateau is from the 12th century, with various additions along the way.  Gorgeous inside & out.  They recently began using the chateau also as a B & B (on sites like hotels.com) & we got to see all the interior living space--- would be a fun place to stay!  Quite unique. We sampled a carnet wine from 1998!  Wow!

I took a lot of pictures today.  My favorite is the black swans in the moat outside the second chateau.

The landscape, of course, felt like the wine country we're most familiar with in California. The weather was gorgeous.  We agreed that we appreciated the sunshine for the wine tours and would be ok if it's rainy when we're in the caves and museums next week.

I'm tired & have to get up early tomorrow, so I'll call it a night.

Jane