21 tourists joined us for the September Tour du Vin in Champagne and Alsace.
The tour began in Reims as we met for a fabulous lunch at the newly refurbished Continental Restaurant before we head for a champagne tasting at Champagne Castelnau.
After a fun evening at Hotel Le Chateau Fort de Sedan, we had an early start with a 4 hour drive East to Alsace. With various sat-nav systems in play, the touring party in around 10 different cars made it to Riquewihr for lunch at Le Caveau des Rois. An entertaining lunch before the heavens opened! Fortunately we were only a short walk to our first tasting in Hugel. where we were looked after perfectly by Jean Frederic Hugel, who is 14th generation! (this tended to be a bit of a trend as we worked our way around Alsace!)
Out last tasting of the day was with Etienne-Arnaud, Manager and owner of Dopff au Moulin. (another estate that has been in the family for centuries, in fact since 1574 in this instance!) A specialist in sparkling, Etienne-Arnaud was very generous in opening more and more bottles up for us to try!
We then made our way to our hotel in Kaysersberg where we were staying for two nights, the 5 star Relais & Chateaux Le Chambard Hotel. A super dinner and a little late night drinking before enjoying a lie in (very rare on our wine tours!) before heading off for day 3 of the trip.
Jean Baptiste Adam was our first port of call where we were shown around by Laure Adam. (15th generation!) We also even managed to wait until 11am for our first glass! Jean Baptiste Adam had an excellent range of whites, reds and sparkling. Their sweet wine was one of the highlights, where many of the members purchased a few bottles.
After lunch at Aux Armes de France, we travelled down the road to Valentin Zusslin for our final tasting. This is one of the wines we sell in the UK, and very much a favourite of sommeliers.
Our final dinner at Cote Vigne in Kientzheim was a belter – certainly a place where we would like to return and highly recommend.
Another super tour with a fantastic group of people. Roll on the next ones in 2019 to Southern Rhone & Languedoc in May, followed by Rioja in September.
