Driving through Champagne

A few weeks ago my sister came to visit me from NZ and we did a big trip through London, then on to Paris via the Eurostar and then a drive through Champagne and Burgundy to Switzerland. After that they flew off to Venice and caught the train to Rome which you can read about here and here.

I seem to be doing a backward recap on my recent trip as I'm now going to do a quick post on Burgundy! After a manic time sightseeing in London and Paris it was such a relief to finally get in the car and and start driving. 

Our first destination was Epernay which was an easy 90 minute drive from Paris and the centre of Champagne production. A number of the big champagne houses are present here including Moet & Chandon and Perrier Jouet. We decided to do a tour at Moet as this seemed the easiest option with the children (it was only one hour). Apart from a bit of shameless advertising and a cringe worthy movie that you had to watch at the beginning, the tour was really interesting. We had a guide that spoke English and she took us around the cellars, gave an informative description on the history of Moet and how it's made and concluded with a tasting ... the best part! 

Epernay also has a few Champagne tasting shops/cellars that you can visit. All the tasting shops that I went to in this area (including Burgundy) generally have a selection of 6 bottles that they choose for the week and you can taste these for around 5 euros for a small tasting or around 25 euros to try them all. I found it really interesting that in the shop we walked into they had a list of about 50 bottles of Champagne for sale and none of them were more expensive than 25 euros.

Champagne is such a beautiful and relaxing region to drive through and every village that you pass has signs up like this:

Hmmm ... which one to choose! I think if you were coming for an organised party it would be good to have a driver and take you around to some of the vineyards. It's definitely an area I would like to explore further when I have more time and most likely when the kids are older as I don't think they found this part of the trip so fun. Although I think my 16 year old nephew got a kick out of trying Champagne!

After a quick stroll down here:

We got back in the car and drove 2.5 hours south down to Etaule, close to the heart of the Burgundy wine region. Come back on Friday to read about that.

MP