April 24th - Chateauneuf du Pape & Orange

4/24/09 – Avignon / Chateauneuf du Pape / Orange:

I arrived from Paris on the TGV and went to collect my rental car. At the office, it quickly became apparent that the rental was going to be a lot more expensive than I had expected from the online quote – mostly because I needed to rent it in Avignon, to be returned in Montpellier, and the expense for a one-way rental was astronomical. On top of that, they would not rent to me a GPS for a one-way rental. I decided to skip it, and took the shuttle into Avignon to check into my hotel.

Once I was on the shuttle, I telephoned to Victor’s father, (Victor is a French Oenology / Viticulture student whom will become an intern with us at Eos this harvest,) Daniel, to let him know that I was in Avignon. He arranged to meet me at 2pm, and we went up the Rhone river about 10 miles to Chateauneuf du Pape. We visited several of the Domaine Beaurenard vineyard sites within Chateauneuf du Pape, and met several of the vineyard workers, who were hand-weeding around the vines. There were so many rocks that the tools they were using were the sturdiest hoes that I had ever seen, complete with a backside of the hoe that allowed them to perfectly work around the trunk of the vines. Daniel said that his system is totally organic now, and in fact he was going entirely to biodynamic viticulture, starting with this season.

Some of the vineyards that we looked at were planted in 1920 – these are some of the oldest vines in their domaine. Daniel said that he is the seventh generation of his family in the vineyards – they have a barn on the property that has been in the family since approximately 1685. Even some of his workers have been there for a long time – one has been an employee for 20+ years, he started working when he was 14. And that employee’s father had worked alongside Daniel’s father, Paul Coulon for most of his career.

The oldest vineyards still producing in their domaine were planted in 1902. ‘Perhaps I will have to replace them, but they still give very good quality wine, but not so much of it’ he said. ‘Or perhaps Victor can replace them!’ It was interesting to see the soil types and how they differed throughout the areas of Chateauneuf. The oldest plantings were established in the areas where there is more clay in the soil, and less rocks. This was the most fertile, and easiest to farm ground. As this land became scarce, growers moved up into the areas where the glaciers deposited mountains of stones. In some places, more than 90% of the soil is made up of rocks! These rocks can reach up to 200 feet deep in places, so they are very well drained. The stones came from as far away as the Alps, carried by the massive glaciers that scoured the valley of the Rhone, and were dropped here when the glacier turned.

In some of these secondary areas, there are huge mounds of stones – the farmers wives used to have the task of carrying stones out of the vineyards, in order to make it easier for the horses to work in the vines. But as many as they pulled up, more shifted up from under the earth – so today there are just as many stones, but many of the vineyards have margins with banks of stones piled up around them. It still would be easy to turn your ankle out here – it is quite incredible!

Daniel told me about a specialist whom he had met with several weeks before. This person is a horticulturalist who works with understanding soil condition and health by analyzing the weeds that grow on the floor of the vineyard. By looking at the type and biodiversity of the species represented, he can tell whether the soil is in a sustainable place, or if it is lacking nutrients, or is not a stable mix of types. This seems quite interesting to me, and quite logical - certainly the state of a soil will determine which species can become dominant in it - and the mixture of types all can give and receive different things within the soil. A stable vineyard soil should exhibit about 20-25 species in this area, according to the specialist - Daniel's vineyards have as many as 42 in some places, and the specialist said that there are no specific challenges that are apparent to him in these locations.

After several hours in the vineyard, we toured the winery, and tasted through the wines. They produce a range of wines, everything from Rose to Cote du Rhone, a very high quality Rasteau, delicious Chateauneuf Blanc, and some magnificent Chateauneuf du Pape Rouge – the wine that this region is justly famous for. The wines of Beaurenard are largely Grenache, with smaller amounts of Carignane, Mourvedre, Syrah, Cinsault. I love Chateauneuf du Pape; it walks a beautiful balance between being a strong, powerful wine of extract and heft, but at the same time it is elegant, not overly tannic, and very layered. You can clearly taste the mineral and restrained ripe red fruit character of the wine, and the use of oak is subtle and tasteful – used to support the fruit and the wine, but not to be an obvious component of the flavor of the wine.

After several hours with Daniel, I met Anna, Victor’s mother. She took me to see the city of Orange, where she grew up, and where she works now. Orange was an important Roman city when they conquered Provence. It still has a mostly intact Roman theatre which dominates the hillside in the midst of the city. It is spectacular to see the workmanship that leaves such a massive, complex structure standing after over 2000 years. This is only one of three Roman theatres in the world to still have its stage wall – the large wall that would be behind the performers – preserved (the other two are in Syria and Turkey.) This keeps the acoustics intact as they were 2000 years ago, and enables the performers to be heard clearly by every one of the 9000 seats surrounding the theater. In the warm summer evenings, there is a full schedule of Opera and other performances that still take place many evenings of the week.

Next, we headed back into Avignon. We met up with Anna’s friend, Michel, who is a pathologist in the city. We went to a restaurant which a friend of theirs had just purchased 2 weeks ago, to sit outside and have oysters. These oysters, which were from near Montpellier, are known to be a bit more salty than the Belons from near Bordeaux. I was told that when I am in Bordeaux, I must enjoy some local oysters (which I will definitely do!)

http://www.beaurenard.fr/