Northern Rhone Winery's
Since, I am in Lyon and so close to so many great wine regions I thought it prudent to hit another region while I was here so me and my traveling buddy decided that we needed to go to the Northern Rhone wine region which sits about 40 minutes west to where we were at. At least I think it was to the west of Lyon. My mental compass gets a little screwed up when I am in Europe. The drive down to this region was actually pretty quick and you knew you were in the region when you notice the big hills that stretch for miles that aligned the Rhone River. These hills were very steep and our driver took us to the top to survey the area before we went to our first vineyard. The roads up these hills were crazy narrow and step with no guard rails or anything. However, once you go to the top it was cool to look down and see the region.
After hanging out for a bit on top of the hill we got back in the van and raced down the hill to our first vineyard (Corps de Loup). Once we got to the base of the hill we pulled into a driveway and I have to tell you I was not sure where we were. We were sort of in a forest but there was palm trees everywhere and it look like a very tropical place that was a bit over groan. We got out and you didn't even know where the vineyard was. Then this guy comes down these steps who sort of had the era of Johnny Depp. This dude looked cool and was cool. He loved his little vineyard, and it's a very small vineyard to say the least, I believe he said they only bottle 12,000 bottles a year and they don't ship wine out of France. By anyone's definition this is a small boutique vineyard.
Well anyway, this guy took us up some old broken steps and opened a rusty door on the side of the hill. We walked into this small room and then he opened another rusty door and we walked into this cool dank cellar where they kept the wine. You would have had no idea this was here by the looks from the outside. (It was super cool and unexpectant.)
Once we did a tour of the cellar and the wine making process we headed up to the tasting room which was small and sort of dank since it was a room that was made of thick stone and was probably a few hundred years old. Since there were only four people in our group was got a pretty stellar tasting where you could ask all kind of questions and get a hand on answer. All in all, this probably was my favorite vineyard that we visited on this trip. I bought a bottle to take back to the hotel since I knew I would never be able to buy this wine in the states. We opened the wine two hours before we drank it to let it breath. Very smooth wine totally worth the price.
This featured blog entry was written by DC Dave from the blog Lyon, France (2025).
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