We mentioned in a post recently that La Revue du Vin de France had a special issue on wine tourism. They had selected the 35 “best” wine routes for the summer. Inspiration for the readers for what to do long and hot summer days no doubt.
The issue is full of good information: wineries to visit, good vineyard walks, hotels to stay at, restaurant that they recommend etc etc. Each spring (around May time) they publish such a special wine tourism and wine travel issue so if you are curious you should perhaps look out for it next year (or order a back issue).
Here are the 35 destinations for wine tours, or rather, their suggestions for wine itineraries:
- Corsica: Patrimonio and Cap Corse
- Provence: between the Alpilles and the arriere pay Varois
- Rhone: from the Rhone Valley to Provence over the Dentelles de Montmirail
- Provence: in the heart of Drome Provencale
- Provence: Bandol vineyards
- Languedoc: from Montpellier to Pic Saint Loup
- Languedoc-Roussillon: at the foot of the Corbieres hills, including the vineyards of Maury
- Languedoc: between the Montagne Noire (Black Mountain) and Canal du Midi
- Rhone: the northern Rhone Valley with the wines and vineyards of Hermitage
- Burgundy: Beaujolais from Brouilly to Saint Amour
- Burgundy: Beaune, the capital of the wines and vineyard of Bourgogne
- Burgundy: Cote de Beaune, at the heart of a myth
- Savoie: from Chamonix to the Lac du Bourget
- Jura: around Arbois
- Alsace: from Ribeauville to Kaysersberg
- Champagne: from Epernay to Vertus
- Paris: in the capital (dedicated to a selection of wine shops in the city although there are actually numerous vineyards in Paris and in the Ile de France region)
- Loire: Touraine and along the Loire river
- Loire: between Saumur and Fontevraud
- Loire: Anjou, between Sarthe and Loire
- Loire: a wine walk in the city of Angers
- Loire: Pays Nantais, in the Far West
- South-West: Duras and Bergerac
- South-West: Cognac country
- Bordeaux: Saint Emilion, a prestigeous appellation
- Bordeaux: from Bordeaux city to the vineyards of Pauillac
- Bordeaux: Pessac Leognan in the Graves
- Bordeaux: the legendary wines of Sauternes
- South West: from Gaillac to Albi
- Portugal: Porto, the cradle of port wine and the gates to the Douro vineyards
- Italy: Tuscany, from Florence to Siena
- Austria: Vienna and along the Danube river
- Switzerland: around the Lac Leman
- Germany: along the Rhine rivers on the tracks of the great rieslings
- South Africa: from Constantia to Paarl
We admit to not doing wine tours to all those destinations (yet) but we do cover a fair number of them with our scheduled wine tours in English and in Swedish as well as our custom wine travel packages. And we do wine tours to quite a few destinations that La RVF does not have on its list of top wine travel destinations. Question of taste! As a matter of fact, we do about as many wine tours in a year as they have on their list!