We’re in the little wine town of Beaune, in the heart of Burgundy. At the recommendation of someone at the Beaune Tourism Office, we walked across town to taste some wine and tour a wine cellar. We’ve arrived at our destination: Patriarche.
Patriarche
Patriarche is a “negociant.” Negociants are the middlemen of the wine business here in Burgundy. They serve a useful purpose. Many small-scale wine growers here need a way to market and sell their wine. That’s where negociants come in. In many cases, negociants buy the grapes, then take it from there, making the wine, storing it, and doing whatever is necessary to turn grape juice into high-quality wine.
On the tour we’re taking, we’re on our own, working our way through the caves at our own pace. There are thirteen tasting stations where we can stop, taste a certain kind of wine, read something about it, then move on. Thirteen tastings sounds like quite few, eh? It sounded that way to us, too, but that was the program. So without further ado, down we went.
Hey, it’s dark down here!
Our first thought was, “Hey, it’s dark down here!” It WAS dark down there. We were in a dimly lit passageway lined with wine bottles on both sides. We could see a light at the end of the corridor, so that’s where we went. It turned out to be the first tasting station.
At the tasting station, there were a couple of open wine bottles on a big barrel. There were some notes about the wine, and some light so we could see what we were doing. We tried out our tastevins. You really can see right through the wine in those little things. We took a taste. Not bad, but it wasn’t anything to write home about – not immediately, anyway. We continued on to the next station.
The next station turned out to be quite a ways away, and the corridor got a little smaller as we went along. Both sides of the corridor were lined with wine, aging in either bottles or barrels. Man, there was a ton of wine down there!
When we arrived at the next station, there was a fellow there to greet us. He told us a bit about the wine at this station, and about these caves in general. In our conversation, he confirmed that the wines improved steadily as we went through the thirteen tastings. We decided to skip the next four or five tastings and go right for the good stuff. After all, we had wine with lunch before we got here, and we still had to find our way back to Dijon.
Down, Down, Down…
We descended down a flight of stairs that led to a long corridor. Down, down, and down we went. It was NOT a short distance between tasting stations. We were starting to realize just how enormous these caves are. The property above ground looked like it may have been a convent at one time. It was a large facility with a big wall around it. We guessed that these caves must circulate around underneath the convent.
On we went, deeper and deeper into the caves. We must have passed thousands of bottles of wine by this time. Expensive wine, too. There’s quite an investment tied up down here, that’s for sure. It was dark and chilly, and a little bit spooky, but not as much as our eyes adjusted to the dim light.
After passing a number of stations, we stopped at one for a taste. We had definitely gotten to the good stuff. And as a bonus, after all the walking we’d been doing down in these caves, now we were thirsty, too.
On we went. If these corridors had been in a straight line, I bet we’d have been all the back at Dijon by now. I wonder if the whole town of Beaune has caves like these underneath. They’re really something.
The last few tasting stations were fancier than the others, and the last sections of caves were wider and nicer. The wines at these stations were really special. But alas, the light was becoming brighter now. We were getting back to the real world. Finally we popped out, back into the showroom where we had started. Whew!
Back “Home” to Dijon
It was time to head back to the train station and then back to Dijon. It didn’t take any time at all to walk to the station. After we waited about twenty minutes, the next train to Dijon showed up. It felt good just to sit and rest our dogs for awhile.
The ride back to Dijon didn’t take long. We walked back to the apartment from the train station. No need for a taxi. Because of the labyrinth of streets for cars, and the abundance of walk-streets, it takes as long to get from the train station to the apartment by car as it does by foot.
Even though we’d only arrived yesterday, arriving at the apartment felt like coming back “home.” The living room was so comfortable. In the kitchen, there was an espresso coffee maker that was calling out to me. It was the kind that uses coffee pods. I gave it a try. The coffee was fantastic.
It felt good just to hang around the “house” for awhile. Pretty soon we’ll go out and hang out at one of the cafés in front of the Dukes’ Palace and watch the world go by. Ahhhhh… I like this place!
To be continued…
All photos in this post are by Arnaud 25/Wikimedia Commons, https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarche_(Beaune)
