A sparkling day out...Part I

We had to do a bit of re-stocking of our wine cellar recently which meant a trip up to Vouvray and Montlouis-sur-Loire with friends with the same objective.

Our first stop was at the 'Cave des Producteurs' in Vouvry where Mike &Liz were picking up a repeat order for friends back in the UK, Jane & Peter were making their first visit and Pauline and I were back for another visit.

On this visit we all decided to take the guided tour of the caves and arrived just in time for the 11.30am tour in English.(there are others at 2.30pm and 4.30pm).They only charge €2.70 and its great value for money.

If you arrive a little early there is a video 'The four seasons of the wine maker' you can watch...

plus a small cooperage (barrel making) museum. These are free to view even if you are not taking the tour.

Then its down into the caves with your guide, on our visit a charming and knowledgeable young lady, where you are lead through part (a short walk) of the vast network of tunnels. After visiting the caves you are then lead across the road to the bottling plant where the is a gallery to view a very small part of the process which is explained in a good video presentation.

(This and previous pic. courtesy of Mike Funning)

Then its on to the serious stuff of tasting and buying - you do not need to buy anything and there was no pressure from our guide...but how could you resist that smile? 

If you haven't already done these we would encourage you to go..oh and take additional clothing even on a warm summer's day as it is obviously a constant 13 degrees in the caves (we didn't!).

Footnote: Next year's production has been severely affected by June hailstorms see article here.