My Life in Languedoc, a Memoir in Chapters #11 - A memoir in Chapters

While the vast majority of my tours were in Languedoc, in 2016 we also ran them in Tuscany, Bordeaux and the Cotes du Rhone. Tuscany was a week to remember. I was joined there by sixteen clients, eight from the USA and eight from the UK and lucky for me Carlos came too. In him I was blessed with one of the best tour guides as well as someone who speaks many languages including Italian. I’d studied Italian wines when working towards the WSET Diploma and had been lucky enough to go on a field trip organised by my professor at Coventry University. Being confident in my knowledge of Tuscan wine meant I enjoyed organising that tour and because the whole Vin en Vacances team had visited the area the previous year on a company jolly, Carlos and I knew our way around reasonably well. It was the first tour I’d put together outside of France and following its success, and with Carlos’s language skills, I wanted to do more.

Catalonia seemed the obvious choice not only because of the good wine the country produces but because Carlos was born there, speaks the language and knows his way around. I dreamed up something I called Shuttle Tours which ferried clients who’d flown into Barcelona over to Carcassonne and what better way to get there than to tour the land between the two cities, tasting local wine and food along the way.

More opportunities to run tours in Catalonia came our way but the pièce de résistance was the bespoke tour we did for a London wine club. They had already toured Languedoc with us and now wanted to tour the cult wine region of Priorat.

I’d learnt the fascinating story of the Priorat wine region during my wine studies and leapt at the chance to do more research as well as taste the wines of course..! We tagged on a few days in the Roussillon because although it’s now in France it had once been part of Catalonia and it made sense to include it. We knew it well as we already ran tours there, but Priorat would be a first so Carlos, Kate and I headed over for a few days to plan the tour.

Priorat gets its name from a priory that dominated the area in medieval times and back then the wines had always been sweet. In the three days we were there I hoped to find out if the ancient style was still being made and with Carlos as my interpreter I asked him to enquire at each winery we visited. The answer was always no, they didn’t make it but not one to be deterred I continued to get Carlos to ask the question right up to the third day and by then he was getting a bit fed up with it.

On that last day we were told of a winery with a very long history and sought it out. Carlos knocked the door and four stories above us the window opened and an old gentleman wearing a string vest leaned out and called a friendly hello. He asked us to wait a moment saying he’d be right with us and moments later opened the door dressed in perfectly pressed blue overalls and was delighted to welcome us in. His son joined us in the impressive vaulted and frescoed cellar deep below the building where we tasted some fine Priorat wines.

We spent a lovely morning there and were about to leave but I wanted Carlos to ask my burning question and nudged him into reluctant action. I’m glad I did as this time the answer was yes, they did make the ancient sweet red wine of Priorat, and I can assure you it was well worth tracking down.

Running tours in other countries and regions of France became a significant part of my business and something the team enjoyed too. It gave them the chance to visit some of the most prestigious wine regions in France and Spain, however these tours took a lot of organising which meant I was tied to the office and touring much less. But when the opportunity to run a tour in Burgundy came along I didn’t hesitate to grab it for myself.

Burgundy is where I fell in love with wine during one of my first visits to France in the 1990’s. If you asked me what my last glass of wine would be I’d say without hesitation a white Burgundy. So when in 2017 I was asked to lead a few tours for a prestigious hotel barge on the Canal du Centre it was a dream come true. At that time Hotel barge Finesse was the largest barge cruising the canal. Guests stayed in one of the four luxury bedrooms and dined in splendour each night indulging in the fine cuisine prepared by Finesse’s on-board chef. Each day their tour guide would drive them to visit some of Burgundy’s best sites or if they chose to book a wine tour, they met me instead.

I took them to visit Burgundy’s famous Cote d’Or vineyards and did my best to demystify the complexity of the appellations while they tasted some of France’s most celebrated wines. Each day I’d pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming, however as much as I loved the wines and that region as I drove back into Languedoc my body’s reaction was very telling.

My heart soared when I saw the familiar landscape and beat faster as I passed the old stone buildings, the signpost to places I love and the lush vineyards nestling in the folds of the land. And back then the joy I felt driving into my village told me Languedoc felt like my true home but what I didn’t know was that this would change and I’ll tell you about that in the next and final episode of My Life in Languedoc.