Medoc: Wine Country, Of Course

Monday to Friday, May 13 to 17

In 2012, we took a Road Scholar tour of the Dordogne and the Bordeaux wine region. The Bordeaux portion of the trip was a week on a river ship. Each day we cruised to another Bordeaux region—wine classes as we cruised, followed by visits to wineries after we’d reached our destinations. It was an interesting trip and a great introduction to this huge wine region.

The Medoc has over 14,000 acres of vineyards, though it is just 5% of the vast Bordeaux wine region. Some of the finest wines anywhere can claim the titles of the eight appellations in the Medoc, and there are many village wines as well.

In 2012, we spent a total of one afternoon in the Medoc region. Two winery tours and tastings and a bus drive through some of the vineyards. We hoped to get a much better feel for the area during this visit

We drove through and by chateaus with names like Lafite Rothschild and Cos d’Estournel, and the vineyards of Margaux and St-Estephe, Listrac-Medoc and Moulis-en-Medoc, St-Julien and Pauillac. All very heady for wine appreciators. We saw lovely chateau after lovely chateau, and stretches of vineyards as far as the eye could see.

We drove through Pauillac several times. It is a port city on the Gironde estuary and is a major commercial center for the wine industry. In 2012, our river ship berthed here as a base for our Medoc exploration. It felt pretty gritty then, and our drives here confirmed that earlier assessment. But I assure you that it is preferable to visit by ship and on foot than it is to drive through this rabbit warren of narrow streets, even with SatNav on the job. After a few hairy experiences, we started avoiding driving through Pauillac even though it is at the center of the area we were exploring.

We knew we would see many but visit only a few of the legions of wineries. We were giving up our car at the end of our time here, so carting wine around was never in the cards. Nevertheless, we wanted to traipse about and see the area in a bit more depth than our earlier visit.

We saw a number of towers in the midst of vineyards and even came across a rather attractive windmill.

We visited the Chateau Loudenne, which was on a pretty site along the estuary.

Tastings here differ greatly from those we might be used to when we drop into a Willamette Valley winery. These are mostly family businesses, who happen to offer a tasting if you want one. At no place we visited did we share our tasting experience with other people. A person would appear or would be summoned to work with us. Usually someone who could speak English, though not always. Always two wines offered, usually with us selecting the two and no fees involved. Many of the more renowned chateaus are open only by appointment. Some offer guided tours for a fee.

We did a tasting in Listrac-Medoc at Chateau Fourcas Hosten.

Another day, another tasting.

We drove by this pretty chateau, but didn’t stop in. We later tasted their wine and decided this may have been a missed opportunity.

It was a pretty and interesting time of year to visit wine country. The vines are leafing out and showing signs of being quite lush. The vineyards were full of machinery and scores of people pruning unwanted growth. This is really big business here, and we got to see it when it was humming.

Our earlier tiptoe into the Medoc gave us a rough idea of what it was, but this exploration took us a lot further down the road, literally and figuratively.