Champers in Champagne 2

Champagne tours and tastings


In Champagne you get the big and famous champagne houses and then you get privately owned family wineries. I’ve done champagne tours on both and loved both. The big houses have all the ambiance, grandeur and wow factor, while the privately owned farms have a lot of personality. Most smaller farms do not do tours, unless you contact them before the time and request a visit and tasting.

Vine covered hills


Spending a day in the area of Champagne is fabulous. You get up and go somewhere for your breakfast (my choice would be a croissant or pain au chocolat), then you can do 2 champagne tours before hunger strikes. Lunch could be a fabulous gastronomic experience in one of the many wonderful restaurants in the area or you can go to a boulangerie and patisserie or the deli section of your local E Leclerc supermarket and buy some picnic things (pates, baguette, cheese, olives, mixed salads, pastries, mmmm). There are so many beautiful places to have a picnic in this area – we did it a few times and I loved it. (and I’m not a big picnic-er) You can sit on a hill covered with vines and just drink in the beauty of the area! Love! Then on you go…perhaps another 2 or 3 tastings in the afternoon (if you have a designated driver) and then spend the last few hours of the sun’s rays on a square, sipping champagne or ratafia before heading into a nearby restaurant and stuffing your face with some lovely French Food, followed by more champagne. Bliss…



(Ratafia is a sweetened aperitif made from the left over Pinot Noir grapes after they are pressed for champagne and then mixed with marc de champagne and put in barrels for at least 2 years.)



I’ve been to many champagne houses and all of them have something special and unique. A lot of the same information gets repeated, but it’s the little extra bits of information that you get from them that makes it interesting – you hear something new about the art of champagne-making or their personal history on each tour, so you are ensured that no tour is ever boring. (and seriously…how can any tour that ends with a champagne tasting ever be considered boring??)



The smaller wineries that we visited were:

Chapuy Champagne

Chapuy: The Chapuy family has lived in the town of Oger for hundreds of years and they started making champagne in 1952. We visited their farm in 2004 during a college field trip and had an amazing time meeting 3 generations of this family. They were such gracious hosts, taking us on a tour of their facilities and giving us a great tasting. It was such a lovely personal experience to meet people who truly loved what they did and who were so excited to share it with us. We each bought a few bottles of their champagne and it was in no way inferior to any of the famous names, in fact, their champagne was truly and spectacularly delicious. They are pretty fortunate with the quality of their terroir – only 17 out of over 300 of the villages in the champagne region can call their grapes Grand Cru and all of Chapuy’s grapes can be classed as Grand Cru – that is quite something. Visit their website for some more information about their champagne. http://www.champagne-chapuy.com



(Terroir is the climate, soil type, topography etc that all play a role in the specific quality of the grapes.)

The Bliard Winery


Jean Bliard: In Hautvillers we had an unplanned visit at an organic champagne maker. During our field trip, our college lecturer slammed on the breaks and our van came to a screeching halt in a tiny street – the rest of us then saw the sign: “Champagne Jean Bliard – culture Biologique”. I was nominated to go knock on the door and ask if we could come in for a tasting (my French is pretty reasonable – which is quite disappointing after spending 3 years and thousands of my mom’s money to learn the language – but like everything else, you loose it if you don’t use it). Shockingly enough, they invited the whole group in, gave us a small tour and a tasting and sold us some champagne. They went all out for us – even doing a sebrage (opening a bottle of champagne with a sword) – what an experience! These people summed up the people of the area – they are so enthusiastic about what they do and when people share their enthusiasm, they are extremely welcoming and friendly.

Monsieur Bliard doing the sebrage